Ficlets of Straw-Hats
by tenebrae di oblio
Summary: Just some short drabbles about the Straw-Hat pirates and the surprises they find while travelling through the GrandLine. T for saftey, just in case. May contain non cannon features, AUs ect...
1. Tribute

**A/N: A set of random fics about weird topics.**

**1-Tribute**

They had boarded the Straw-Hats' ship, Sunny-go, 15 minutes ago and since then everything had gone to hell.

They had been severely beaten by three pissed off pirates before being punted off the ship. 'Cyborg' Franky, 'Dead Bones' Brook and 'Straw-Hat' Luffy had looked like they were making an announcement when they had boarded but they didn't hear anything other than "We formed a Band." Before they were all beaten, bruised and chucked in the water only to see the Sunny-go rocket into the distance with a shout of

"COUP DE BURST!"

Straw-Hat POV

Franky, Brook and Luffy had disappeared into the cabin after their announcement and had emerged carrying 3 mics, a speaker, a keyboard, a guitar and a full drum kit. The rest of the crew were not aware that they even had a guitar, let alone the drum kit, 3 mics, a speaker and a keyboard that Franky and Brook were setting up on the lawn. Where had they been keeping all this? Did Brook bring it onboard after his final 'Soul King' concert?

Their musings were brought abruptly to a halt and they were all surprised when Luffy expertly fingered the strings on the guitar, since when could Luffy play an instrument? Hell, since when could he hold a tune?! Then when Brook began by picking out a gently melody on the keyboard and Franky beat a steady rhythm on the drums, whispers were echoed across the deck, when had they had time to practice, they were so in sync.

They stopped whispering when Luffy began to sing (with Brook and Franky as his back-ups), surprisingly he was not tone deaf and could actually sing quite well, which raised the question of why he hadn't sung like this before.

"**I am the shadow, and the smoke in your eyes, I am the ghost, that hides in the night"**

"_**Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM! **_

_**Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM!**_

_**Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM!**_

_**Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM!" **_Franky and Brook chorused.

"**Wait, wait a minute take a step back**

**you gotta think twice before you react **

**so stay, stay a little while**

**because the promise I kept is the road to exile **

**HEY! whats the circumstance you'll never be great without taking a chance so**

**wait, you waited too long **

**had your hands in your pocket **

**when you shoulda been gone~"**

"_**Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM!"**_

"**One push is all you'll need" **

"_**Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM!"**_

"**Fist first philosophy" **

"_**Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM!" **_

"**We watch with wounded eyes" **

"_**Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM!" **_

"**So I hope you recognize**

**Out on the front line **

**dont worry I'll be fine **

**the story is just beginning**

**I say goodbye to my weakness**

**so long to the regret **

**and now I see the world through diamond eyes.~"  
**

"**DAMN! damn it all down **

**took one to the chest without even a sound so **

**WHAT! what are you worth **

**the things you love or the people you hurt **

**HEY! it's like deja vu **

**a suicidal maniac with nothing to lose **

**so wait, it's the exception to the rule **

**every one of us in EXPENDABLE~."**

****_**"Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM!" **_

"**One push is all you'll need" **

"_**Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM!" **_

"**Fist first a philosophy" **

"_**Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM!" **_

"**We watch with wounded eyes" **

"_**Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM!" **_

"**So I hope you recognize**

**Out on the front line **

**don't worry I'll be fine **

**the story is just beginning **

**I say goodbye to my weakness **

**so long to the regret and now I know that I'm alive **

**Out on the front line **

**don't worry I'll be fine **

**the story is just beginning **

**I say goodbye to my weakness **

**so long to the regret and now I see the world through diamond eyes~." **

**"Every night of my life**

**I watch angels fall from the sky **

**Every time that the sun still sets **

**I pray they don't take mine~."  
**

**[ Luffy's Guitar Solo]**

**"I'm on the front line **

**don't worry I'll be fine **

**the story is just beginning **

**I say goodbye to my weakness **

**so long to regrets~." **

"**Out on the front line **

**don't worry I'll be fine **

**the story is just beginning **

**I say goodbye to my weakness **

**so long to the regrets and now I know that I'm alive~." **

"**Out on the front line **

**don't worry I'll be fine **

**the story is just beginning **

**I say goodbye to my weakness **

**so long to the regret and now I see the world through diamond eyes **

**Out on the front line **

**don't worry I'll be fine **

**the story is just beginning **

**I say goodbye to my weakness **

**so long to the regrets and now I know that I'm alive **

**Out on the front line **

**don't worry I'll be fine **

**the story is just beginning **

**I say goodbye to my weakness **

**so long to the regret and now I see the world through diamond eyes~." **

****_**"Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM! Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM! Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM! Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM! Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM! Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM! Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM! Boom-Lay Boom-Lay BOOM~!"**_**  
**

The crew Straw-Hats stood in silence as the final chord echoed around them, all they could think of was Marineford and Ace. But as they saw their happy-go-lucky Captain grinning at them, they realised that this was his way of remembering, a tribute song, and they smiled and cheered and clapped for the weird band, the song and for the one who wasn't here to hear it.

END

A/N: I really suggest listening to this song, it's (Shinedown - Diamond Eyes.)  PLEASE REVIEW!


	2. Math

**Math**

"Luffy. Luffy. LUFFY!"

THWACK

"OUCH!"

"Thank you Zoro. Now Luffy let's go over this one more time, 4 x 3 is?"

"7?"

"IDIOT!"

THWACK

This was the noise coming from outside the kitchen as Nami, Zoro and Robin attempted to teach their Captain basic maths. It wasn't working.

"Let me try Nami." Robin said.

"Ok, Robin. It's clear that we're (Me and Zoro) are getting nowhere."

"Captain-san you have missed 100 days worth of meals. How many meals have you missed all together?"

"500."

"You have 500 pieces of meat and to win a competition you have to eat it all in 2 days. You cannot eat it all on the first day or you lose. How many pieces of meat do you eat every day?"

"250."

"You hav pieces of meat, how many pieces of meat do you have?"

"9."

"Now, banana is 5, apple is 7 and meat is 10. Banana x meat x meat x apple x banana, equals?"

"Oi oi, there's no way that he'll-"

"17500."

"See Captain-san isn't as dumb as you think." Without further ado Robin left to go find a good book to read and Luffy bounded out to ask Sanji to make him a snack.

Nami and Zoro were left standing there gaping at the spot where Luffy had just stood.

"Genius." Nami stuttered out, Zoro just nodded and went to find some sake, he needed to be drunk right now.

END


	3. Staff and Pipe

**A/N: I got this idea from Nekoi Kurona's Inspirational ideas list. **

**Staff and Pipe**

"LLLLUUUUUFFFFFYYYYY!"

The rest of the Straw-Hat crew winced, when Nami shouted like that, it was bound to be something to do with their Captain and something very bad. They were right.

"AAAAAAAHHHHHHH!" Luffy came shooting out of the Women's cabin screaming, Nami's old bo staff was clutched firmly in his hands. Nami shot out after him, clima-tact in hand and screaming profanities at the rubber man running away from her across the lawn.

Of course, in classic D-luck fashion, this was the perfect time for the Marines to catch up with them and board the Sunny. The rest of the crew ignored the warring Navigator and Captain in order to ready themselves for the fight that would soon be upon them.

Of course , at this point, Nami just to throw Luffy across the ship just as the Marines were coming onboard, and Luffy just had to miss all the Marines, not hitting a single one, and land in the thick of them, bo staff still in his hand. The crew sweat-dropped and put away their weapons, content to watch their Captain take out the Marines.

They were surprised, and in Robin's case intrigued, when Luffy elegantly twirled the bo staff to strike the Marines around them, knocking them out instantly. He held the staff in two hands, spinning it to strike out at the Marines that were now running at him. Nami's jaw dropped when he thrust the end of the staff into a Marine's neck, using it to propel the unfortunate Marine into three others, propelling all four of the over the railing and into the sea.

All the men, pirates included, winced as Luffy rammed the bo staff straight into one Marine's crotch, said Marine dropped to his knees and threw up whilst curling into a foetal position. Luffy didn't even look twice, he just glanced at the Marine and spun away whilst swinging the staff in a wide arc, slamming into a dozen Marines and knocking them overboard. In Luffy's hands, that staff was an arc of destruction, and he was clearly proving it with the ease that he wielded it to knock the remaining Marines flying overboard.

The whole crew stood there, except Robin who just looked amused, jaws touching the deck as they struggled to comprehend what their Captain had just done. _Their_ Captain, the same Captain that _never_ used a weapon in fights except to prove that he _couldn't_ use a weapon in fights, had just taken out at least 50 Marines using Nami's old bo staff. What the hell?!

Finally Nami managed to stutter out a coherent sentence, "L-Luffy, where did you learn to use a staff?"

"I've never used a staff before."

Luffy's reply had jaws dropping back to the floor, and Robin looking even more amused, was Luffy really naturally talented with a staff or something…? Zoro decided to speak for the crew, "Oi Luffy, if you've never used a staff before, then what the hell was that?"

"Oh…Well I've used a pipe before." Luffy replied with his casual shit-eating grin.

"A pipe." Was Nami's elegant reply.

"Yup, a long metal pipe. Ace taught me how to use it to fight. Your staff is similar, so I thought that you could use it in the same way."

"How are they similar?!" Nami demanded.

"You use them to hit people." Classic Luffy-logic, it made sense in the most basic way possible.

The crew sweat-dropped again and left their Navigator and their Captain to their argument, Nami should know by now, you don't question Luffy's logic unless you wanted a headache, Nami will regret that in an hour after Luffy had repeated the same line at least 100 times.

However the men on the ship all had the same idea, they would destroy that staff. They didn't care that Nami would probably kill them for it; seeing Luffy hit that Marine in the crotch sent shivers down their spines. Think of the damage that Luffy, the one who got into arguments with all of them all the time (,the same arguments that usually ended in fights), could do to them with that staff.

Yes, they thought, the staff had to go.

END

**A/N: What d'ya think. Review please.**


	4. Multiplying

**Multiplying**

Zoro, Nami, Usopp, Sanji, Chopper, Robin and Franky returned to the Sunny after going ashore to get supplies and leaving their Captain to protect the ship. Their first thought was that it was quiet, this immediately rung warning bells in their brains; Luffy was never quiet, even when sleeping and this lack of Luffy-induced noise was bugging them. So they set out to find their Captain, he wasn't in the boy's cabin, the kitchen, the girl's cabin, the library, the workshop, Usopp's factory, the sick bay, the bathroom or the training room and that left only a few possibilities of where he could be, although they had noticed in their search that most of the blankets and pillows were missing.

It was Zoro that found Luffy, being Luffy's first nakama had somehow made him a literal Luffy translator and tracker, a skill that was honed by how many times he had to track down his wayward Captain when he disappeared on islands when they docked. He found Luffy in the aquarium bar in a nest of blankets and pillows, snuggled up to a lump that was also covered in blankets and pillows, what bothered Zoro was that the lump seemed to be _breathing_.

Zoro drew his katana and roughly poked the lump; a hand dragged the blankets and pillows off of the lump and revealed a tired, freckled face. Zoro relaxed and sheathed his katana, before turning and leaving the sleepy brothers alone. He returned to the deck, for once not getting lost, and told Nami, Robin, Sanji, Franky, Usopp and Chopper where Luffy was and who he was with. This required an explanation for Franky but everything went smoothly.

_The next day…_

Luffy and Ace had slept through the night and had woken up around lunchtime the next day. The rest of the crew had left by then. Going ashore again because Franky and Usopp had ordered some tools and Sanji wanted to stock up for the brothers' black hole stomachs. Unfortunately Sanji couldn't get all of his supplies so they resigned themselves to returning to the town the next day and went back to the ship. Silence met them, _again_. This time they knew where to find Luffy and Ace so they immediately headed to the aquarium bar only to find that now instead of two sleeping lumps there were _three._

Sanji flicked the covers off of the sleeping lumps with his foot to reveal Luffy sprawled on top of a blond haired man and Ace sleeping on the man's shoulder, the blond had his arms around both brothers and in turn the brothers had their arms wrapped round him and each other. The crew sighed and turned to leave, the man was clearly important to Ace and Luffy, so they decided to give the guy the benefit of the doubt and leave him alone. For now.

_The next day…_

The crew returned from their last day of shopping and found the Sunny quiet….again. Since this was starting to become some sort of pattern, the crew headed to the aqua bar, silently praying that this was _not_ becoming a pattern because there were very few people who could arrive next, and two in particular that they didn't want here. Under _any_ circumstances.

Their prayers were ignored when they found five sleeping lumps in the nest of pillows, three clumped together and the other two on either side. The covers were, again, removed to reveal Ace, the blond man, Luffy, Garp and Dragon. The last two were what the crew had been dreading and they all backed out of the room, closing it quietly so not to wake the sleeping dragons, pun intended.

They turned to each other and grimaced. Surprisingly it was Zoro and Sanji that managed to sum up the situation in one eloquent sentence.

"Shit they're multiplying."

END


	5. Protect and Priority

**Protect**

_It hurt….breathing hurt…how long had he been laying here….he can't remember…._

It was a nice sunny morning on the Sunny, it was peaceful and quiet…..which was strange because, even on the best of days, the Sunny was boisterous and loud and there was always at least one person making lots of noise, whether its Luffy being Luffy or Sanji shouting at Zoro or vice versa or Usopp and Franky working on their latest inventions or….well you get it, the Sunny was LOUD.

Like now…

"BREAKFAST!"

_Breakfast sounded good but he couldn't move….he felt hot….so hot…._

Sanji's cry echoed around the deck and quickly the rest of the crew rushed to the kitchen so that they could save their meals before their captain, with a black hole for a stomach, could get to it. However Luffy was missing and, looking around, so was Zoro. Now Zoro they could understand, he usually slept in and missed half of breakfast anyway, but Luffy never missed breakfast, _never,_ unless he was knocked out from a fight and they hadn't fought in weeks.

_Someone was coming closer….he could hear their footsteps…everything seemed so loud…._

"CHOPPER!" Zoro's cry echoed around the kitchen, much like Sanji's had.

_He felt tired….sleepy….Can't move…He had protected them….they were ok….they were safe…_

Zoro's voice was filled with desperation, fear and they could tell, from that one word, that something was very wrong. They immediately scrambled from the kitchen, discarding their breakfasts, and, with Chopper in the lead, ran onto the deck. They arrived on the deck only for Zoro to run at them, grab Chopper and run back over to the front of the deck, near the figure head. They followed him only to stop in shock and gasp at the sight that they were met with.

_How long since he had fought…he didn't know….didn't care….they were safe…safe…._

Luffy was lying sprawled out on the deck; Zoro and Chopper crouched over him, blood dripping from the many wounds that seemed to litter his body. His skin was pale and you could see the veins through his skin, he looked so fragile, so weak, as if he would break if you so much as touched him, it was scary seeing their captain like this, their captain who was strong, and never gives up, even with the odds stacked against him, looked as though he were dying right in front of them.

_He couldn't feel anything…except the pain….but they were safe….he had protected them…_

Zoro was pale, following Chopper's instructions by gently cleaning the wounds and helping the little doctor to bandage them all. Chopper then motioned for Zoro to take Luffy and put him on the bed in the infirmary, they couldn't put him in the men's cabin as there were no beds and this way Chopper could keep an eye on his condition.

_He was lying on something soft….he felt warm….someone was holding his hand…..another came and held his other hand….it was nice…._

Sanji and Zoro stayed up all night monitoring Luffy's condition, they had a few scares when Luffy coughed up blood or when he started to convulse but apart from that Luffy was fine. Chopper came in the next morning to check on Luffy's wounds and reported that they were healing nicely and that Luffy would wake up in a day or two, then they could find out which bastard had hurt their Captain and kill him.

That day passed slowly, Sanji only left the infirmary to cook the meals and Zoro didn't leave at all. Sanji had to save him some food at every meal time so that he didn't starve. The night also passed agonizingly slowly, Sanji and Zoro took turns between patrolling the ship, watching Luffy and napping.

When Luffy did wake up the next day, he was immediately tackled by his enthusiastic and first mate and his worried cook. He just laughed and brushed off their questions about how he had got injured and who had done it. All he would say was that they bastard was a devil-fruit user and he was dead, more questions had revealed the Luffy had killed him by bodily throwing him off the ship and into the sea he had watched the guy sink himself and was sure that the guy was dead.

The rest of the crew were shocked that Luffy would just kill someone like that, watching a fellow devil-fruit user drown while he stood by and did nothing. But Sanji and Zoro knew differently; the only reason that Luffy would kill someone was if they had threatened or were a threat to his nakama. This attacker must have made the mistake of threatening Luffy's crew members and he had paid the price for it.

It was one of the reasons why Luffy was their Captain; no matter the situation his nakama came first. And they all loved him for it.


	6. Scars

**A/N: A short fic about scars. **

**I don't own One Piece. **

**Scars**

They had never noticed. They had never seen past the obvious, so they had never noticed. Despite how many times his nakama had seen him without a shirt or naked in the showers, they had never seen them, so they did not think that they were there. But they were, they were _always_ there.

They were obvious to him; he'd had them for most of his life. Most of them were new but some were old, very old. He'd had them when he'd got his first nakama but his first-mate had never seen them. Or he had but he hadn't seen them for what they were. _Scars._

To him they were his life, a memory of all his achievements and failures, when he had wanted to laugh and when he had wanted to cry, when he had been at his best and when he had hit rock bottom.

His scars were his life and his nakama couldn't see that, they couldn't see his life, the good or the bad, his memories, his failures and his achievements, they couldn't see any of it and that _hurt_.

But there was one that they could always see, one that they could look upon, it was the one that reminded him of the promise that he had made, why he had become who he was, why his wanted posters contained the name 'Mugiwara.' So when they asked him how he had got the scar under his eye he told them, he told them about Shanks and his crew, about the bandits, the Sea King and his promise to the one who had given him his hat.

He was happy when they asked him, they knew about his past, if only a small part of it. But he wanted them to know more, he wanted to tell them, he wanted them to see his scars, his life, carved into his body forever, he wanted them to _know_. He couldn't just talk about it, his life was special to him, and he didn't want to tell it to anyone that didn't want to hear it.

So he wore vests and shorts to try and show them his life, he had always been partial to shorts and vests, they were more flexible, but he wore the shorts and the vests to try to get his nakama to see him, to see underneath the obvious.

At first, he thought that it didn't work, that no-one could see them, that his life was invisible to their eyes, that they did not want to hear it, to know of it but then _she_ asked the question. The one that he had waited for, the one that he had been dreading, the one that was his greatest strength and his greatest weakness.

"Captain-san, where did you get those scars?"

Scars. _Scars_. Plural, that meant more than one, more than the one under his eye, but which ones?

The other members of his crew had been watching him, waiting for his reaction, waiting to see what would happen. A few were looking him down, eyes widening when they finally saw the multitude of scars that covered his body. Fists clenching when they saw the worst, gasping at how they had never noticed before.

"Which ones?"

The crew seemed to pause here and they thought, it was as if he was asking a question with one answer, and they were right, and there was only one answer that he wanted to hear, just one.

"All of them."

His face spread into a happy grin, eyes sparkling as he gathered his eight crew members around him as they sat in a circle waiting for his story.

He was happy, he was overjoyed. He dreaded what happened next and yet he wanted to tell them everything, whatever happens happens. He couldn't change that, nor would he want to. He wanted this, he wanted it so badly. So he told them. He told them his past, his achievements and failures, his best, his worst, he told them about his scars. And as he told them, he grinned and even when he wanted to cry as old memories were dredged up he still grinned because right now Monkey D Luffy couldn't be happier.

**A/N: What do you think? It came to me when writing an assessment, a weird little drabble but still….**

**REVIEW PLEASE **


	7. Marks

**Summary: Sequel to Scars, the crew have seen most of Luffy's past but Ace hasn't. AU in a way that Ace is alive.**

**Marks**

It had been 2 years since the Marineford fiasco, where the Marines failed to execute Portgas D Ace, and the Straw-Hats had reunited and were about to set sail for Fish-man Island when,

"LUFFY!"

A loud scream tore through the air as the-man-the-Marine's-failed-to-execute himself pulled up alongside the Sunny in his fire powered striker and hollered at his little brother,

"LUFFY IF YOU DON'T LET ME UP RIGHT NOW THEN LITTLE BROTHER OR NOT I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!"

Said little brother simply ignored the threat and told Franky to let Ace into one of the unused docks.

Ace scrambled into the dock, the whole crew could hear his loud steps as he ran through the docks, up the ladder and came flying through the trapdoor, aimed straight at Luffy. Luffy didn't even attempt to dodge and both he and Ace went flying across the lawn, landing next to the mast in a heap of tangled limbs. After untangling themselves they took one look and the stunned faces of the crew and promptly started to laugh.

Nami sighed and ignored the giggling brothers in favour of directing the rest of the crew on how to prepare the ship for its undersea journey. The crew, in turn, smiled at the brothers' reunion and went to business preparing the ship, but not without complaints – cough Zoro cough – and nosebleeds – cough Sanji cough.

It was only _after_ the Sunny had sunk between the waves that the crew finally noticed that Ace and Luffy were no longer laughing…in fact Ace looked quite serious and he was staring at the huge 'X' scar on Luffy's chest. He traced the scar with his fingers as he pulled Luffy onto his lap, cuddling his little brother against his chest, as if to re-assure himself that Luffy was still there.

Luffy simply smiled up at his brother reassuringly, sensing Ace's inner turmoil. Ace smiled down at him, Luffy had always been good at cheering him up, he thought as his fingers brushed over one of Luffy's many scars.

…

…

_Many scars….. _

Ace seemed to be on fire (he wasn't, he didn't want to hurt Luffy), filled with murderous rage, _many scars_ he thought. Luffy didn't scar easily, not since he ate the rubber rubber fruit anyway, to scar Lu you had to practically blow a hole in him. This was why Ace was so angry because, for Luffy to have all of these scars, someone, somewhere along the line, must have blown a hole in him, several by the look of it.

Ace gently removed Luffy from his lap, before promptly stripping him of his open shirt and shorts, leaving him sitting on the deck clad in only his boxers.

The crew stood dumbstruck; first Ace and Luffy had been cuddling and giggling, then Ace had gotten a dark look, then they were both happy again, then Ace had got a murderous aura and now he was stripping Luffy! What the hell was going on!

Luffy ignored the fact that his brother had just stripped him and cutely tilted his head to the side, obvious question marks floating above him, and said "Ace, what's wrong?"

Ace didn't answer; instead he stared intently at Luffy, scowling as he picked up more and more scars on the smaller teen. He completely froze as he saw a round circle of scar tissue on Luffy's stomach; he craned around to glance at Luffy's back and cursed when he saw the same circle there too. It looked like someone had literally cut a hole out of him with a cookie cutter, it was disgusting.

Ace wordlessly touched the circular scar, it felt rough under his fingers and he silently cursed whoever had done this to Luffy, before sending one look at his little brother, silently pleading for an explanation.

Luffy caught on, he had always been good at reading people, and explained that Crocodile had been the one to give him that scar and that the fight that he'd got it in wasn't the last time that he'd battled the Shichibukai.

Ace then moved to another scar, a curved one on his neck and shoulder that looked like a shark bite, then Luffy repeated the process, explaining how he'd gotten the scar from Arlong when the bastard bit him, but this time he also pointed out other scars that he'd acquired in the same fight. At the same time Ace was mentally making a list of who he had to kill for scarring his little brother.

The cycle continued, Ace silently pointing out scars and Luffy telling him the story behind them all, there were some that he didn't need to explain, the one under his eye and the biggest one on his chest for example, but the story telling passed the time until they were deep below the waves and they kept on going until Ace ran out of scars to point out.

When Ace was satisfied, knowing which bastard he had to kill and all about his little brother's fights, he re-dressed Luffy and pulled the younger teen back onto his lap. Ace wrapped his arms around his little brother and whispered, "They shouldn't be able to hurt you this much….they shouldn't be able to scar you Lu."Luffy smiled and whispered back, "I chose to become a pirate Ace; I chose to fight those battles. My dream is to be Pirate King and a good Pirate King does not run away from his battles. These scars are marks of my path and my dream; I'd never want to be without them."

Ace smiled "You always know what to say, don't you Lu."

Luffy nodded as Ace's head fell onto his shoulder, the soft snores that followed signalled that Ace had had one of his narcolepsy fits. Luffy smiled and snuggled into his older brother, finally realising that the rest of the crew had left the deck….except one.

"Well 'marks of my path and my dream.' Didn't know you were so poetic, Captain." A familiar voice spoke out, carrying an ingrained smirk.

"Shut up Zoro."


	8. Distraction

**A/N: Don't know where this came from….**

**Distraction**

"Are you sure about this Mugiwara-boya?"

"Yup, Iva-chan!"

"You know I proposed this and all, but even I'm having second thoughts."

"Sshh Croc-y, we need to get focused before we get there."

"Luffy are you sure you can do this, you're the lead, if you fail, everyone else does too."

"Of course Bon-chan and I proved it when we practiced!"

"Right, let's do this."

0000000000000000000000000000 0000000000000000000000000000 000000000000000000000000

Sengoku looked out at the battlefield, it was going well, but if nothing big happened it would be a draw overall….maybe he should bring out the big guns…..

"YOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHH!"

He looked around, where had that come from?

"WOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOO!"

There it was again, that same voice, it came from…above?

He looked up to see something fall from the sky….was that a marine ship? What was it doing up there? And more importantly, who was onboard?

0000000000000000000000000000 0000000000000000000000000000 000000000000000000000000

CRASH

The marine battleship crashed onto the ice, sending wooden splinters flying everywhere, marines and pirates alike dived out of the way of the ship and it collapsed into a pile of rubble.

Sengoku winced, 'no one could've survived that, what a way to go' he thought.

He was wrong, oh so wrong.

Five figures rose from the rubble, carrying huge boxes, boxes that were soon unloaded of their gear which was then set up around the rubble of the Marine ship.

The fighters looked at the five in astonishment, those five were big, well two not so much, but well known and just what the heck were they carrying.

The first was Mugiwara no Luffy, bounty of 300million, and he had a cordless microphone in his hand and standing in front of a large keyboard. The second was Ivankov the revolutionary in his female form, and she was standing next to a huge drum kit. The third was ex-Shichibukai Crocodile, and he was carrying a cello, but had a violin in a case as well. The fourth and fifth were Buggy the clown and Baroque work's Bon Clay and they were holding guitars. Just _what _were they doing?!

"Yo." Luffy spoke into the mic. "We've come to deliver entertainment."

Shocked silence met his statement, but he just ignored in and motioned to his fellow musicians to start.

"Our first is called 'I don't care.'" Luffy added.

Crocodile started with the cello, playing out a sombre melody. Soon Luffy raised the microphone and started to sing along to the haunting tune, they all had to admit that, when he wanted to be, he was quite a good singer.

"**I try to make it through my life,  
In my way, there's you...  
I try to make it through these lies  
And that's all I do.**

Just don't deny it,  
Just don't deny it  
And deal with it,  
Yeah, deal with it  
You tried to break me  
You wanna break me  
Bit by bit  
That's just part of it."

Bon, Buggy and Iva then took their cue to join in on their guitars and drums for the chorus.

"If you were dead or still alive,  
I don't care,  
I don't care  
And all the things you left behind,  
I don't care,  
I don't care."

The sound of the guitars and drums faded at little at this point to allow Crocodile to play out a few piercing notes on the cello before the next verse.

"I try to make you see my side  
Always try to stay in line  
But your eyes see right through  
That's all they do  
I'm getting tired of this shit  
I've got no room when it's like this  
What you want of me, just deal with it

So...

If you were dead or still alive,  
I don't care,  
I don't care  
And all the things you left behind,  
I don't care,  
I don't care."

_**[Crocodile's Cello solo]**__**[In the background, Luffy continued:]**_**  
"Nothing can care about,  
I'm taking care of it.  
You won't be there for me,  
You won't be there for me."**

Luffy then stuck the mic into the slot on the keyboard to perform a small Piano solo on the keyboard before he took up the mic again and continued with the song.

"If you were dead or still alive,  
I don't care,  
I don't care  
And all the things you left behind,  
I don't care,  
I don't care

If you were dead or still alive  
I don't care (nothing can care about)  
I don't care... (I'm taking care of it)  
And all the things you've left behind  
I don't care (you won't be there for me.)  
I don't care... at all."

The music faded out into silence that was soon filled by the approving roars of the crowds, on the battlefield and all over the world. Who knew that when they tuned in to see an execution, they would get a free concert? The fighters in Marineford were very grateful for the entertainment, fighting got very tedious after a while.

"You happy now?!" Luffy screamed into the mic over the roars of the crowd. Iva and Crocodile shared a secret smirk, 'Mugiwara is good with crowds' they thought, 'It was a good idea to put him as the lead.'

"You want another one?!" He continued.

The roar of 'YES YES YES' was all the confirmation they needed. They all smiled and fingered their instruments as Luffy shouted,

"ALRIGHT! Our second is called 'Choir of failure!'"

Crocodile started again, this time with the cello and Luffy added in background chords on the keyboard.

"**Take all the filth that remains  
And make me new inside, make me new inside  
The lions are hungry tonight  
Hear my cry, hear my cry."**

Iva, Bon and Buggy came in with the drums and guitars.

"I'm transfixed by your beauty  
Your gaze upon me  
Your lips whisper my name  
Ever so gently,"

Luffy sang, staring at Hancock.**  
"You promised me the world  
You two-faced liar  
The apple takes my hand  
Points to the fire." **He continued, this time staring at Crocodile.

"Take all the filth that remains  
And make me new inside, make me new inside  
The lions are hungry tonight  
Hear my cry, hear my cry."

Buggy came in with a small guitar solo.

"Into your lair I stumble  
Desire burning  
Your fragrance fills the air  
Like flowers blooming  
Your poison seeps right through  
I notice gushing  
Pierced lungs filled with regret  
The perfect drowning.

Take all the filth that remains  
And make me new inside, make me new inside  
The lions are hungry tonight  
Hear my cry, hear my cry.

Cry, cry

Now it's all over  
And I stand alone  
Betrayed by your lies  
My hands won't stop shaking  
The thought of forsaking  
My true love and leaving your side  
It begins with a choir of failure united by truth  
With clear eyes and steady hearts willing  
Your voice says:  
The old has gave way to the new

Take all the filth that remains  
And make me new inside, make me new inside  
The lions are hungry tonight  
Hear my cry, hear my cry."

Again the music faded out, to the roaring of the crowd. Luffy was breathing quite hard now, having to shout out the whole song just to be heard.

"How was that one?!" He yelled. Ignoring Bon and Buggy's snickering to the left of him.

"GREAT! Last one now-"

The crowd groaned, when the entertainment was gone, they would have to start fighting again.

"Don't groan," Luffy shouted, "You'll like this one!"

The crowd cheered, they'd liked all of the songs.

"Our final song is called HURRICANE!"

Luffy started this time, expertly playing the keyboard while Crocodile played the background chords on the violin. A few second later Buggy, Iva and Bon came in.

"**No matter how many times that you told me you wanted to leave  
No matter how many breaths that you took, you still couldn't breathe  
No matter how many nights that you lie wide awake to the sound of poison rain  
Where did you go? Where did you go? Where did you go?  
As days go by, the night's on fire**

Tell me would you kill to save a life?  
Tell me would you kill to prove you're right?  
Crash, crash, burn, let it all burn  
This hurricane's chasing us all underground

No matter how many deaths that I die I will never forget  
No matter how many lives that I live, I will never regret  
There is a fire inside of this heart  
And a riot about to explode into flames  
Where is your God? Where is your God? Where is your God?

Ooooooo-ooohhh Ooooooo-ooohhh

Do you really want...  
Do you really want me?  
Do you really want me dead,  
Or alive to torture for my sins?

Do you really want...

**(Heart beat, a heartbeat) ****{**Crocodile and Bon sung in the background.}**  
Do you really want me? ****( I need a heartbeat, a heartbeat)****  
Do you really want me dead, ****(You know I go' a leave, you know I can't stay) ****  
Or alive to live a lie? ****(You know I, let go, I can't stay****)**

Tell me would you kill to save a life?  
Tell me would you kill to prove you're right?  
Crash, crash, burn, let it all burn  
This hurricane's chasing us all underground."

The music seemed to pause for a second before continuing.

"**Oh will call upon God.**

Tell me would you kill to save a life?  
Tell me would you kill to prove you're right?  
Crash, crash, burn, let it all burn  
This hurricane's chasing us all underground

Whoa, This hurricane

_**[x3]**_

Whoa  
Do you really want...  
Do you really want me?  
Do you really want me dead,  
Or alive to torture for my sins?

Do you really want...  
Do you really want me?  
Do you really want me dead,  
Or alive to live a lie?

**I'll live away from the night, x2 I'll live the weight of a lie, I have the way to save your life."**

The song cut off abruptly, and there was a second of silence before all of Marineford began to scream again.

The five musicians bowed,

"Thank you everyone, you've been a wonderful audience!" Luffy shouted as Buggy, Iva, Bon and Crocodile received the signal and began to pack up.

"We hope to see you all again one day!" Luffy continued, to the groans of the crowd.

"Now now we don't want to leave either," Luffy soothed, "but we have many places to go ad little time to do it in!"

"HAVE A GREAT NIGHT! WE BID YOU ADIEU!" Luffy shouted as all five bowed again before jumping onto a ship that had appeared in the ice free waters and sailing away as quickly as they could.

Sengoku stood stunned; Mugiwara could certainly make an entrance…and an exit. He turned to Ace and said "Your brother sure is enthusiastic about what he does." Before he realised that he was talking to thin air. He stood stunned, when had Ace escaped?! He quickly turned to Garp to find only thin air again, quickly searching the battlefield he found no sign of the escapee, in fact there were no pirates at all! What had…."MUGIWARA!" He screamed, "HOW DARE YOU TRICK ME!"

0000

Far away, the five band members, Jimbe , the Whitebeard pirates and Ace sat laughing at how well their plan Ace had went. Who knew that all it took was five people, a few musical instruments, some good songs and someone who knew the Marineford layout.

**END**

**A/N: Here are the websites for the songs if you want to listen to them, none of them are mine and I may have twisted the lyrics in one of them.**

** watch?v=hpn-PcAMbas**

** watch?v=Ot_g8xfsoLc&feature=endscreen&NR=1**

** watch?v=dAQDF7lLYa0&feature=fvwp&NR=1**

**Please REVIEW!**


	9. Thunder

**Thunder**

Nami was puzzled. This was an odd feeling for her, as not many things could actually puzzle her, she could predict the weather with pinpoint accuracy, she could draw maps so detailed that even Luffy would have a hard time misreading them (Zoro was a lost case on this one) and she could use her clima-tact to manipulate the elements to take out her enemies with graceful vengeance, she understood all of that and could do it quite easily.

What she didn't understand was the fact that after every huge storm all of the guys would sleep in until really late, even Sanji! And when she knocked on the door to wake them up, no way was she going in there, all she got were grumbles. Once Robin had dared to go into their quarters, and emerged smiling mysteriously, telling Nami that they should let the boys have their sleep in.

This puzzled her, they always went to sleep early when they hit a storm, and Franky said that the Sunny would be fine, but none of them should be on deck, in case they fell overboard, and Nami had agreed, so they were all sent to bed early. But then what could be the reason for the guys being absolutely shattered the next morning, despite the fact that they never complained about it, both she and Robin could tell that they were tired, even their stamina-freak of a captain was sleepy and usually fell asleep on the deck the day after the storm.

What the hell did the guys _do_ when there was a storm anyway?! She was determined to find out! So the evening of a huge storm, 15 minutes after she and Franky had sent everyone to bed, she snuck into the boy's room, using mirage tempo and settled to wait and see just what was keeping the guys up. She didn't have to wait long. A few minutes after she arrived a soft whimper was heard throughout the room, it was soon followed by a soft sob, then another and another. Was someone crying? She wondered.

She tried to pinpoint where it was coming from, she listened hard but all she could tell was that it was coming from one of the top bunks, and since the boys liked to switch around al lot she had no idea where it was coming from, she would have to wait until someone woke up then. Again, she didn't have to wait long, Zoro rose up from his top end bunk and quietly crawled into the top middle bunk, shuffling round slightly he quietly picked up the inhabitant, who was the source of the sobbing. Nami was shocked when she noticed the familiar crop of black hair, Luffy's hair, before Zoro wrapped him in a blanket and held the smaller teen against his chest.

"Luffy….Luffy….shh, its okay, the storm can't hurt you, its okay." Zoro soothed, rubbing circles on Luffy's back.

Nami blinked, rubbed her eyes and then blinked again, she had never seen Zoro be so…gentle, normally he had all the caring of a sledgehammer, but it seemed that, with Luffy, he was like an older brother. She was so caught up with watching Zoro and Luffy interact, that she barely noticed the other 4 boys climb out of their bunks and settle around the low table that was in their room. She did noticed Zoro gently carrying Luffy over to the table after leaping off the middle bunk, as he settled down Zoro pulled a deck of cards and a dice out from under one of the pillows and set it down in the middle of the table.

Boy's POV

"So what are we going to play this time?" Sanji asked, lighting a smoke.

"I think we should play Fish." Chopper chirped from his place between Usopp and Franky.

"Nah, let's play Rummy." Usopp replied.

"Twist is SUPA~" Franky whisper shouted.

"Blackjack is good." Sanji said, exhaling a large cloud of smoke.

"Poker." Zoro grunted, shifting so that Luffy was settled comfortably in his lap.

"Don't mind." Luffy sniffed, snuggling into his blanket.

"Why don't we roll for it." Sanji suggested, holding up the dice.

"Yeah," Chopper agreed, "1=Fish, 2=Rummy, 3=Twist, 4=Blackjack, 5=Poker and 6 is 'roll again.'"

"Who should we have roll?" Usopp asked.

"Luffy." Zoro grunted, the others nodded in agreement, since Luffy hadn't chosen a game he was impartial. Sanji passed the dice to Luffy, who had to free his arm from the blanket to catch it, and they all watched as he rolled it onto the table.

"It's a 6, roll again." Chopper said. Luffy rolled again.

"6." Luffy threw it onto the table this time.

"6. Again."

"6….What sort of luck have you got?!" Sanji exclaimed as the dice rolled onto six for the fourth time in a row.

"6." Zoro scowled and whispered something in Luffy's ear before he threw again.

"5. Looks like we're playing Poker." Chopper said, slightly disappointed.

"You cheated!" Sanji cried.

"How could he have cheated?!" Zoro growled, "It's an unrigged dice!"

" I don't know how but you did!" Sanji retorted.

" DIDN'T!"

"DID!"

"DIDN'T!"

"DID!"

Nami POV

She slipped out of the door before they started to throw things, Zoro and Sanji had a habit of getting violent in their fights. She merrily skipped down the corridor and back to the girls room, thinking about what she had just witnessed. It certainly explained why the boys were so tired in the morning, if they stayed up playing card games to try and make Luffy fall back to sleep, but it was very cute, she definitely agreed with Robin, they really did need their sleep in!

But who would have thought, she mused as she opened the door to her and Robin's shared room, that the fearless, reckless and brave Captain of the Strawhat Pirates- the same person who never ran away from a fight and could pound his enemies into the ground - ,would be afraid of thunder!


	10. Kantai

**A/N: Another Marineford fic, I'm addicted to these for some reason XD**

**Oh and Luffy is reasonably OOC for most of this. **

**I don't own One Piece but really wish that I did!**

**Summary: The Straw-Hat crew hear about Ace's execution while they're on Thriller Bark. After they defeat Moria and their injuries are all healed they set off to stop the execution….with some help of course. P.S. I won't tell you what the title means until the end or it will give too much away!**

**Kantai**

"EEHHHH! ACE IS GOING TO BE EXECUTED IN TWO MONTHS?!"

This was the cry that greeted the sleeping occupants of the Thousand Sunny early one morning after the whole debacle in Thriller Bark, needless to say, they were not happy being woken up and almost killed their hysterical Captain….until Robin helpfully pointed out what said hysterical captain was screaming about, then the situation turned grim.

"What?! Ace is going to be executed?!" Nami demanded, scanning through the newspaper furiously.

"Yeah." Luffy said dejectedly. "At Marineford, it's being broad casted around the world."

"Eh?!" Usopp cried. "Why?! What did Ace do to get a worldwide execution?! The only other person to have an execution that big was the Pirate King!"

"It doesn't say why only when and where." Nami growled.

"Sorry but who's Ace?" Brook asked tentatively, not willing to upset the already furious navigator and captain.

"Ace is my nii-chan!" Luffy cried with a big grin on his face.

"Oh! Luffy-bro's Aniki!" Franky added, "Ace-bro is going to be executed?!"

"Yeah I have to stop it! I gotta save Ace!" Luffy cried running towards the door.

He was abruptly stopped be two hands yanking him back by the collar.

"Now wait a minute." Sanji and Zoro growled, in sync, which was proof of how serious this was since neither commented on it.

"They're right we can't just let you run off on your own, who knows what trouble you'll get into!"Nami shouted.

"Yeah Luffy, we all like Ace here, let us help you out." Chopper said.

"Really?...You guys….ARIGATO!" Luffy cried as he latched onto the nearest person and pulled them into a crushing bear hug. The unlucky unfortunate was Usopp, who nearly had his ribs broken by Luffy's enthusiasm.

"Yeah yeah…" Nami said as she bonked Luffy on the head making him drop Usopp, who immediately scurried away from the energetic captain, "Now how are we going to do this then….And no Luffy we cannot break him out of prison, he's being held at Impel Down, it would be suicide to even try….So Robin any ideas?" She said as she turned to her female companion.

"Well," Robin started "I do have one idea, it's pretty risky and will take up most of our time and put as really far out of our way. It will also be expensive, incredibly so, Nami we may have to use your treasure fund to cover all of this." At this Luffy turned up at Nami expectantly and stared at her with his, to only be used in dire circumstances, special move…The Puppy Dog Eyes of Doom.

"Ok….." Nami muttered, trying to fight the effect of Luffy's Puppy Dog Eyes of Doom, "but next time we come across any treasure it's all MINE!" Nami screamed.

"Good. Now here's what we're going to do, we can't intercept the boat, there will be Marine battleships swarming the place, and admirals, so we're going to hit them where it hurts…"

0000000000000000000000000000 0000000000000000000000000000 000000000000000000

_Seven weeks and six days later, the day before the execution_

"You were right Robin~" Nami sighed, "This whole operation took a sizeable chunk out of my treasure trove, but the idea was genius, very well thought out. Is everything ready?"

"Yep."Luffy grinned, "Sanji checked three times and everything is going well!"

"Well?! It's going brilliantly ROBIN CHWAN~ YOU ARE SO SMART" Sanji cried, doing his noodle impression while complimenting Robin the whole time.

Zoro sighed but did not comment, he knew that if he and Sanji got into a fight now both Nami and Luffy, who had been strangely serious and dare he say _smart_ recently, would both hit him and hell had no fury like the two of them together, it gave him shivers and that was saying something! Besides they needed all their energy for tomorrow, it was going to be _big._

Apparently Nami and Luffy agreed with Zorro's thought because they declared that the whole crew go to bed, well Nami declared and Luffy added the magic words of 'Captain's orders' on the end, but hey whatever works.

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_The next day, Marineford_

Sengoku looked around at the battle that was sure to go down in history, the Whitebeard pirates and their allies had arrived not ten minutes ago and five minutes before that he had told the whole world Ace's parentage. The battle wasn't going well, it was even at the moment but there was still one factor that hadn't arrived yet and it was the factor that he was counting on, Mugiwara no Luffy, Ace's sworn brother and son of Revolutionary Dragon.

If the Marines could capture Mugiwara then they would hold a good amount of leverage over the Revolutionaries, even if Dragon was a heartless monster he _had_ saved Mugiwara back in Logue Town and that showed that somewhere, deep down, Dragon cared about his son. This was all the more reason to kidnap him and use him as a hostage, to control the blasted organisation that was tearing apart countries and went against the World Government.

His plan was going so well, soon he would release the Pacifistas and they would tear apart the pirates, sure quite a few would get destroyed but they had over a hundred of them at the moment and they were all here in Marineford. At first he would only release 10 or 20 of them but if more were needed those numbers could be upped and raised with a simple command through his den den mushi.

But before he did that he had to get rid of the commanders and Whitebeard or at least keep them occupied. Sengoku wasn't sure how well Pacifistas could stand against the commanders and Whitebeard but it wouldn't be pretty any way you slice it, so it was imperative to get them out of the way, or occupied, first or who knows what could happen.

While this thought track was going, rather quickly, through the mind of the fleet admiral, a wrench was on its way to Marineford to put a stop to his plans.

It was a rather big wrench…..huge in fact…..with one very big skull and crossbones wearing a straw hat painted on the side…..

00000000000000000000

_With the Mugiwaras, 15 minutes away from Marineford_

"Right have we got everything?" Nami asked, slightly nervous.

"Yes." Robin calmly stated.

"Is everyone running at full strength?"

"Yes, Luffy has just eaten, Zoro's just woken up, Sanji has had many many cigarettes, Franky is at full capacity and has stored spares somewhere in his body for later, Chopper has his rumble balls and spares, Usopp has dials as well as shots and spares, you have your clima-tact and dials, Brook has exhausted our milk supply and I have had a good night's sleep and a good lunch and we are all good to go…..that includes the _others_."

"Right. Is the Gaon Cannon loaded?"

"Yes and there are another 300 barrels of cola waiting in the hold, just in case."

"Phew this was hard work. But it'll be worth it. Now call everyone in here please Robin, we need a last minute meeting."

Robin left and returned not a minute later with the rest of the crew, who were all serious and ready to go as they calmly took seats round the table.

Luffy stood and, in a never-to-be-seen-again show of seriousness, addressed his loyal crew, "Right I know the last two months have been stressful, on everyone, but this is where it all comes together, we're all here and we have to stick to the plan. The _others _know what to do, but our objective here is to get to Ace and get him out alive, everything else, except for the welfare of our nakama, comes secondary." He glanced slightly at Zoro here who nodded in return; he got the message, 'Don't go after Mihawk' "I want all of us to make it out alive."Luffy continued, "So let's go kick some butt!" His usual shit-eating grin firmly in place as he said this and no sign of the seriousness that he had shown before on his face.

His crew grinned, their captain knew when he had to be serious and when he had to be silly to egg them all on, and despite his naivety their captain was very good at reading people.

"Now, last but not least," Luffy said, grinning evilly, "I have an idea, hear me out….."

The fighters at Marineford didn't know how much shit was about to hit the fan in less than ten minutes, but if they could see the grins on the faces of the Mugiwara pirates as they heard their Captain's next words, they would've run away screaming.

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_At the same time, in Marineford_

**The Brother**

Ace was hoping, no praying, against all hopes that his little brother didn't come here under any circumstances. He couldn't live with himself if Luffy came here and got hurt or god forbid died trying to save him, it would make all the promises that he had made to Sabo worthless, he couldn't break that promise. Sabo's least request had been to take care of their little brother, and Ace would keep that promise even if he was killed in the process.

**The Wannabe Lover (even if she doesn't know it yet)**

Boa Hancock was having a bad day; she had been roped into fighting an all out war against Whitebeard and his allies for the Marines. It pissed. Her. Off. And to make it even worse they were all weaklings, pathetic, I mean what she would do to get a real man in her life, (on the Sunny, Luffy sneezed, rubbed his nose, shrugged and went to the figure head to see if he could spot Marineford yet.)

**The Enemy-Ally**

Whitebeard surveyed the battlefield and checked on how his sons and daughters were doing; occasionally he would send a burst of Haki at a random Marine that was heading in his general direction. But he had seen the outcome of this battle, unless a big game changer came along the battle would be a stalemate (only a few minutes away said game changers all sneezed in sync but brushed it off and carried on preparing for war.)

00000000000000000000

They all sensed them before they saw them, every fighter with decent Haki could pick up the large force that was coming towards them, it wasn't huge and didn't contain as many fighters as the Whitebeard armada but it was a force to be reckoned with none the less.

Then they saw them, ships of all shapes and sizes coming towards them, fast. The ones with keener eyes could pick out giants, some sort of flyers and even subtle waves that showed them that the force extended underwater too.

Right in the middle, leading the ships was a large brightly coloured ship, that appeared to have what looked like a flower on the front, some snorted at this but others who knew whose ship this was almost gulped.

A few marines even whimpered slightly and up on the execution tower Garp almost blanched when he realised who was coming here. He sighed and internally he welcomed the arrival of insanity incarnate as Monkey D Luffy arrived at the battle.

00

Then the flower headed ship seemed to jump forwards and suddenly it was right next to those from the Whitebeard armada.

Then to the amazement of the Marines and the Whitebeard pirates the mouth of the flower, no _lion_ they now realised, seemed to open and a bright light obscured the inside. Then great beams of light shot from the open mouth, straight at the Marines and Admirals who scattered to avoid the destruction that they caused.

Sengoku gaped as he watched the lights destroy everything that they touched, if Kizaru weren't standing next to him then Sengoku would have thought that the admiral was the one causing the destruction.

Ace gaped as he watched his brother's ship; he could see his little brother's flag on the mast and painted on the sails so it was his ship, destroy the battlefield that had held up against giants and earthquakes, with no effort whatsoever. And whoever was aiming that thing was a genius, never once did one of those light beams hit a fellow pirate. Thank god that this destructive light thingy was in his little brother's hands; at least Ace knew that he wouldn't abuse it.

When the lights finally did stop, the pirates and marines returned to gaping as they saw that the destructive light actually came from a canon. Sure they had seen pretty powerful stuff but this was like nothing that they had ever seen before, it didn't look like a cannon ball was shot and there was no devil-fruit user that could have caused that apart from Kizaru and he was an admiral and would never fight for the pirates. Not to mention that the thing was damn near unblock-able, only the admirals had been able to stop it and no one could intercept it either, quite frankly it was scary.

Then a haunting laughter rose from the Sunny, as her crew emerged on the deck, and god if looks could kill the marines reckoned they would be ash by now with the combined looks that the monster trio were giving them as well as the give-me-all-your-assets look that the burglar cat was giving them all and the rest of the crew who were grinning evilly at them, yes if looks could kill the marines would be dead as well as beli less and atomised by now.

The haunting laughter, as it turned out, was coming from the Captain and skeleton, now for those who have never seen a skeleton laugh; it is very unnerving and coupled with the fact that Luffy was wearing a look that promised pain and _**giggling**_ at the same time, _people were scared. _Now add that to the fact that every second of this battle was being broadcasted to the world, and…..well…..the Mugiwaras' bounties were going to soar.

While the marines had been watching the pretty lights the rest of the Mugiwara force had arrived, up close it was daunting and coupled with Whitebeard's armada it was damn near terrifying seeing that many strong pirates all in one place. Some of the crews in the Mugiwara force were **big.**

00

On the Sunny the Mugiwara crew grinned, they had recruited, bribed, blackmailed and used many favours to assemble the force that they had brought to Marineford. Some of the pirates they had brought with them were tricky to convince but with a few favours and a _lot_ of gold, they had been bought easily.

All in all the crews/members of the Mugiwara force were:

Dorry and Brogy (through favours)

Baroque Works (threats, debts and a lot of blackmail)

Crocodile and Mr 1 (who had been very easy to get to all it required was bribery)

Wiper and his force (favours)

Gan Fall and the Skypieans (favours)

Enel (who they had also bribed)

Oimo and Kashi (who had owed Usopp a favour from Enies Lobby)

Perona (bribery and debt)

Emporio Ivankov and Inazuma (a little secret about Luffy's heritage and bribery to get them out of prison)

Jinbe (intercepted on the way to Impel Down)

Galley-la (favours)

Franky-Family (Franky)

Rosy Life Riders (debt due to Sanji)

Heart Pirates (an accident involving Luffy, Zoro and 20 barrels of Sake)

The Kidd Pirates (only because Law and Luffy were going to be there)

The Bonney Pirates (a favour won by Luffy in an eating competition)

The CP9 (bribery and debt)

Arlong and his pirates (Nami and _lots _of blackmail)

All in all they had gathered 18 different forces of all different sizes and had combined them to make the (temporary) Mugiwara armada. It had been hard, expensive and very time consuming but it was worth it in the end.

Luffy smiled and opened his mouth wide; his crew noticed and quickly plugged their ears, "AAAAAAAACCCCCCCCCCCCEEEEEEEE EE!" He screamed, letting his voice resound across the field, the scream reaching his older brother, who grinned and frowned at his little brother's presence.

"WE'RE HERE TO SAVE YOU AAAACCCCEEEE! WE'LL BE THERE SOON!" He yelled before attempting to launch himself off the ship, only to be caught by Zoro.

"Oi, oi Luffy don't run off by yourself." He said dropping his Captain back on the deck.

THWACK

"OW, Nami what was that for?!" Luffy asked, rubbing his head where Nami had hit him.

"BAKA! Stick to the plan or we might not save Ace!" Nami yelled.

Deflating slightly Luffy mumbled an 'ok' before Nami asked "Everyone know what to do?" At their nods she went to continue but something caught her eye. Glancing out of the corner of her eye she spotted a sandy dot moving towards the Moby Dick and quickly thought up a plan of action to deal with it.

"Ok, Luffy go stop Crocodile from attacking Whitebeard, Zoro and Sanji go with him, then tell Whitebeard the Intel that we gathered and then return here. Got it!?"

"HAI!" They yelled, with a 'Nami-swan' added in by Sanji, and, after Luffy had casually poured a container of water over himself, they leapt off the Sunny and onto the Moby Dick.

Luffy intercepted Crocodile with a water logged kick to the guts and accidently sent him towards the railing where Sanji and Zoro were standing, Sanji and Zoro simply dodged and kicked him off the Moby Dick and onto the Sunny with a chorus of "Get out of my way" before hopping onto the deck next to their Captain.

"Yo." The monster trio said eloquently, completely ignoring the fact that they had just set foot on a YONKOU's ship without permission, and waltzing up to Whitebeard himself with ease.

Luffy grinned as he gazed up at the yonkou with absolutely no fear and said "Hey ossan."

Sanji and Zoro sweat dropped – only Luffy would go up to one of the strongest pirates to sail on the grand line and call him 'ossan.'

"Hey brat." Whitebeard returned, "Here to save your brother?"

"I will rescue Ace. At all costs."

"You're going to get both yourself and your crew killed." Whitebeard stated.

At this Luffy growled and glared at Whitebeard, "No I won't," he forced out.

"You will. the level here is too high for your crew and your allies." Marco stared.

At this, the Monster Trio almost snapped. Zoro and Sanji growled at Marco with a look that clearly said 'SHUT UP!' And Luffy…well Luffy started to laugh, coldly, as he stared at Whitebeard and said, "My allies have _very _high bounties, have you heard of Ivankov of the Revolutionaries or maybe Jinbe and Enel. Or Oimo, Kashi, Brogy and Dorry. They're strong, don't underestimate them. As for me and my crew, don't say we're weak, we're not so don't say it." The Whitebeard pirate's blinked, those we some very high up names, Mugiwara hadn't been kidding when he said that he would rescue Ace at all costs if he had assembled a force like this just to get his brother back.

"Anyway," Sanji butted in, "we came here to tell you our Intel, according to it Ace's execution is going to be pushed forward as soon as they find one of your commanders and trick them into harming you. Once you're out of the picture, they'll unleash their secret weapon, the Pacifistas, and execute Ace."

"Use that Intel well," Zoro growled, "It cost us more than money to get it."

Whitebeard nodded thoughtfully and told Marco to warn the Commanders for trickery, and the rest of the crew to be safe. Meanwhile Luffy had turned and was walking towards the railing with Zoro and Sanji following after him, they leapt onto the railing and paused as Luffy stopped just before them. Luffy turned back and said "I know what you're doing, you want One Piece. You may value your crew as family but you still want One Piece and you're crew want you as Pirate King. Do whatever you want but no matter what…..I WILL BE PIRATE KING!" He yelled the final line before leaping off of the ship and back onto the Sunny.

00

On the Moby Dick Whitebeard smirked, the brat was saucy. He turned back to Marco who was smirking off to one side and told him not to let the kid die. Marco smirked and grinned, not questioning his captain's orders; after all, he liked the kid too.

00

Back on the Sunny the Monster Trio landed on deck with light thumps and were immediately pulled into an interrogation by Nami.

"How did it go? What did he say? What was his reaction? Why did you shout at him Luffy? What-"

"Nami!" Luffy yelled, snapping her out of interrogation-mode, "We're wasting time. We're here for a reason. You can interrogate us after we save Ace and get out of here, but not a minute before."

The whole crew blinked at him….what he said was almost _smart_, it was logical and it even made sense…. it was almost scary….there was now….the indisputable fact….that….their Captain…. had a brain! THE WORLD WAS GOING TO END!

Then Luffy ruined it by attempting to launch himself off of the ship, again. Zoro caught him, again, and Nami told him off (again.) The rest of the crew sighed in relief; the world was not going to end.

"Right," Luffy said as he nursed the new lump on his head, "everyone, stick to the plan. And Croc-y?"

'Croc-y' grunted, which Luffy took as a yes.

"If you try that crap again I will personally pound you into the ground and kick the shit out of you, literally." Luffy stated, grinning evilly.

Crocodile gulped and nodded meekly - and to his credit, Luffy could be pretty damn terrifying when he was pissed off, even Zoro admitted it – Luffy smiled happily and said "Good!"

His crew and allies (who had now gathered on the Sunny for last minute instructions) sweat-dropped at their commander's compete 180, but proceeded to ignore it in favour of listening to the last minute instructions that Nami was now giving them.

"Remember the plan, and no attacking people for personal gain, we will not be happy as Crocodile so eloquently proved, remember we're here to get Ace and get out alive. If any of you screw up your part of the plan I will personally make sure that you are penniless before we kill you, slowly and painfully. Got it!?" She roared with beli signs as eyes.

Again the crew and allies sweat-dropped at the navigators thirst from money, but nodded anyway – they didn't want to get hit over the head again, because damn that woman had a good right hook when she was angry!

They turned to face the battlefield and remembered when Luffy and Nami told them who they should fight – though he didn't look like it, Luffy was an excellent judge of skill and character, so he paired up the top ally fighters with Marines and Shichibukai so that they would be able to defeat their opponents and Nami was there to explain exactly why they were paired up against their opponent.

_Flashback – 30 minutes ago_

"_Right, Enel you have Kizaru and if you can Aokiji." Luffy stated. _

"_Lightning vs light. So you should be able to keep up with his fast attacks. Lightning vs ice, the ice will conduct and shatter under your lightning so his attacks will be useless." Nami explained._

_Enel smirked and nodded, he was looking forward to his fight._

"_Iva you're up against Kuma." _

"_Since he was a revolutionary you should know his attacks the best, plus see if you can get him on our side. Okay?"_

_Iva nodded; he had a bone to pick with Kuma anyway._

"_Jimbe and Arlong, you have Moria." _

"_Since you're mermen you can use the salt water to take out his zombies."_

_The mermen grinned at each other, thinking that it would be good to fight together again. _

"_Oimo, Kashi, Dorry and Borgy, you're up against the Giant Squad."_

"_Giant vs Giant, you can counter the strength that they wield with your own. Also they're probably not used to batting other giants so you have the upper hand since you have more experience."_

_The giants grinned at each other; it had been a while since they had fought enemy giants._

"_Perona and Bonney, you're fighting Hancock."_

"_Hancock uses her beauty as a weapon; since you, Perona, can depress her she can't use her beauty against you. And if Bonney can de-age her she won't be a threat. Just don't get caught in her beam or you'll get turned to stone."_

_Perona and Bonney smirked evilly, they'd show that woman that she wasn't the most beautiful or powerful female on the seas. Unknown to them they were emitting an evil aura that had most of the men backing away in fear, all the men then resolved themselves not to go anywhere near the giant cat fight that was going to go down in Marineford. _

_Luffy and Nami ignored the flaming women and continued to assign the fighters their opponents._

"_Kidd, you have to fight all of the Pacifistas."_

"_Since the Pacifistas are robots and made out of metal you can control them, you are their worst enemy and it's essential that you take them all out, they can easily take out most of the pirates here. But don't mix them up with Kuma, our Intel tells us that they were made to be based on his powers and looks."_

_Kidd gritted his teeth and smiled evilly, these robots were made of metal and anything metal was his to control._

"_Law your opponent is Donflamingo."_

"_Both you and he have the power to manipulate people, you through your rooms and he through his strings. Don't be caught in his strings and catch him in your rooms first. If you think that you're going to lose, retreat. You're one of our best doctors and we'll need you to treat all of our wounds afterwards."_

_Law fingered his nodachi, he understood why he should retreat but he wasn't going to do it unless he really had to._

"_Crocodile, you are to help Law."_

"_Thanks to your sand sand fruit you can slip through Donflamingo's strings, so he can't control you as easily."_

_Crocodile nodded, it made sense._

"_Lastly, Wiper and Lucci, you're job is to cause mass destruction. You are to help out with anyone who needs it."_

"_Since you're abilities are suited for most of the battles, you are to help out everyone. Lucci, with your speed and agility you can aid anyone who needs it and easily slip out of the fights when we have the upper hand. Wiper, with those dials of yours, you are a wild card. Those dials can be used to surprise the enemy so that we can gain control of the fight."_

_Wiper and Lucci smiled, they were going to enjoy this._

"_I've already told my crew what they should do," Luffy continued, "So stick to the plan and your opponents and leave the rest to us. If you defeat your opponent then go and help the others to finish their battles. When I give the signal that we've got Ace, distract your enemy and get out of their and retreat back to the ships. We're counting on you guys, so don't lose and don't die."_

_Flashback end._

"Yosh! Everyone let's go!" Luffy yelled, leaping off the Sunny and onto the battlefield, with his crew and allies following closely behind him.

They were quickly engaged by the Marines and rushed to find their opponents before they were engaged by someone too powerful to ignore – an admiral, for example. Some of the fighters found their opponents easily; Enel was already fighting Kizaru when the massive catfight started between Perona, Bonney and Hancock, a few minutes into the battle. Others, like Law, were having problems getting to their opponents, especially when they kept on manipulating people in front of you to block your way.

The battle of the giants was the first to start; they couldn't really miss each other, and the rest of the fighters, pirates and marines were giving the giants a wide berth so that they weren't accidently trampled in the fight.

Kidd was smashing Marines with giant metal arms, waiting for the Pacifistas to make their appearance and when they finally did, they were quickly beaten, meanwhile Crocodile had finally cornered Donflamingo and was soon joined by Law as the three way battle started between the Shichibukai's past, present and future (although one of them didn't know about that yet!)

At the same time Jimbe and Arlong had found Moria and were already beating him down into the concrete, while Enel had managed to rope Aokiji into his and Kizaru's fight and the whole area around them had been reduced to ice and rubble and the only signs that the fighters were still there were the random flashes of light that darted across the rubble.

Meanwhile Wiper and Lucci were just causing mass destruction as they teamed up with the rest of the Skypieans and CP9 to literally punch holes through the Marine ranks. The rest of the fighters had former small groups and were picking off the marines one by one. The Rosy Life riders had leapt into the sky on their flying fish and were pelting the Marines from above with bullets and bombs.

At the same time the straw hats had split into three groups; the Monster trio had grouped together to make a pathway to the execution tower. Nami, Robin and Franky had infiltrated the main Marineford base to get the key to Ace's cuffs, then they would pass it onto one of the Monster trio or come around the back and use Robin's devil fruit powers to remotely unlock the cuffs. And Chopper, Usopp and Brook had joined up with various groups to help them pick off enemies; Chopper was with the Skypieans, Brook was with the Arlong pirates and Usopp was on one of the flying fish.

Naturally, the plan went well – to begin with anyway – until…

"Shit!" Nami swore loudly.

"What?" Robin and Franky asked, they were already deep in the bowels of Marineford's main base, there was no turning back now, and after going through 14 different draws in the main office, they had finally found out where the keys were. But there was a problem…

"It says here, 'By order of Sengoku, all keys to Portgas D Ace's sea stone cuffs are to be given to the Shichibukai and Admirals for safety'." Nami groaned, crumbling the important looking document in her hands.

"Damn it!" Franky groaned, "This is so not super! What do we do now?!"

"We contact Luffy, Sanji and Zoro and tell them where they can find the keys and then we get out of here and help them to get one." Robin stated, ever the voice of reason.

"Genius Robin! What would I do without you!?" Nami exclaimed, pulling a baby den den muchi out of the pocket of her shorts.

"Now we just have to tell Luffy." Franky stated, grinning slightly, all was not lost!

With the Monster trio…

"Oi dumbass-cook, what's that ringing?!" Zoro yelled over the battle, slashing his swords round in a full circle, to create a whirlwind to smash through the enemies around them.

"What ringing, damn marimo?!" Sanji yelled back, smashing through another wave of enemies, with a barrage of kicks.

"SANJI! SNAIL!" Luffy yelled, as he used gomu gomu no Gatling to send the remaining marines flying.

"WHAT?!" Sanji screamed back, using his anti-manner kick course to send dozens of marines flying, he didn't get what Luffy was trying to tell him.

Thankfully Zoro did, "THE DEN DEN MUSHI YOU IDIOT!" Zoro roared, violently slashing through a line of marines using Oni-giri.

Sanji growled at him, removing the baby den den mushi from his jacket pocket, before holding it closed to his ear – so that he could hear it over the cacophonous roars of the battle – and answering it with a loud "Yes?"

Luffy and Zoro did a good job of defending him, while Sanji had a short conversation over the den den mushi. Both Luffy and Zoro hoped that it was good news, but were not encouraged by Sanji's darkening look and the clenching of his fists.

Finally Sanji said his goodbyes before stowing the baby snail safely back into his jacket pocket and removing a smoke instead, lighting it in an instant and taking a deep breath.

"What's wrong?" Luffy asked moving closer to his crew-members so that they could speak without being over heard.

"Good news: they found out where they keys are being kept." Sanji started.

"Great!" Luffy exclaimed.

"Bad news: the Shichibukai and Admirals have all of them." He finished.

"Shit." Zoro growled, absent-mindedly beheading the marine that was sneaking up behind them.

"It's okay." Luffy said, his straw hat covering his eyes.

"How?" Zoro and Sanji asked, doubtfully.

"I know where to get one now." Luffy continued, rocketing over to the nearest Shichibukai…who just happened to be Boa Hancock, who hated all men with every fibre of her being.

"LUFFY GET BACK HERE!" The other two members of the monster trio roared at him, realizing just _who_ he was heading for, but they couldn't be heard over the battle. Scowling, they turned their fury at their captain onto the marines. Their tortured screams could be heard echoing across the battlefield.

Meanwhile, Luffy had landed next to Hancock, interrupting the fight between her Perona and Bonney, he ignored the glares that his two allies were giving him and instead turned to Hancock.

"Do you have a key to Ace's cuffs?" He asked, staring straight up at her.

"Who are you to ask me this?" Hancock snapped, pointing down at him and looking so far down at him that she was looking up.

"I'm Monkey D Luffy, the man who will become pirate king." Luffy snapped back.

Hancock went to answer back, but was caught off guard as a wayward attack caught her from behind, it didn't do much damage, but it was enough to rip her dress, exposing her back. She whirled round see where the attack had come from, and Luffy caught a glimpse of her back, but, luckily form them Perona and Bonney didn't as they were too far away and at the wrong angle to see it.

"The thing on your back….it looks familiar." Luffy mumbled quietly. Unfortunately, Hancock heard him.

"What?!" She cried, spinning to face him with a look of horror on her face. "You saw it?!" She demanded, hastily covering her back with her arm.

Luffy nodded, still trying to remember where he had seen it before.

"Then you must die! I can't let you live after seeing it!" Hancock screamed, furiously kicking out at him.

Luffy, caught off guard, quickly jumped away from her, dodging her furious swings and devil fruit attacks.

The played cat and mouse for a few more minutes, with Luffy dodging all of Hancock's anger and Haki filled attacks, until Hancock over exerted herself and the back off her dress ripped. She fell to her knees, shocked as, almost in slow motion, the back of her dress fell from her hand and fell away to reveal her back.

FLUMP

Hancock was pulled out of her terrified thoughts as a Marine Captain's coat fell over her shoulders, concealing her back from view just as her dress revealed her mark. She looked up, shocked, at the man who was her enemy and had just protected her, gratitude shining in her eyes.

"Why?" She whispered.

"That mark has nothing to do with our fight."Luffy said simply, bending down to tie the coat in place around her waist with a sash that he had taken from one of the pirates nearby. Once he was sure that the coat wouldn't slip to reveal her back, he helped her stand.

"Thank you." Hancock said, blushing.

"It's okay, let's continue the fight." Luffy replied, getting into his gear second stance.

"No." Hancock said.

"Ehh?!"

"Here." She handed him the key to his brother's cuffs, "You helped me, so I will help you. I'll help you save your brother." She stated.

Luffy smiled, slipping the key into his pants pocket, as he hugged her around the waist and was surprised when she hugged him back. He chirped a loud "THANKS" before rocketing off, back over to Zoro and Sanji who were watching the scene with looks of jealously and bewilderment.

Hancock then turned back to Perona and Bonney, who were staring at their commander with looks of disbelief, and said,

"Do you want to team up to fight these bastards?" Motioning at the marines behind her, "We should show them how powerful we women are."

Perona and Bonney shared a look before turning to Hancock and holding out their hands, men around the world shuddered as the three women clapped hands and the female version of the monster trio was formed.

Oblivious to the monster he had created, Luffy was immediately rushed at by his flaming cook upon landing, Sanji then proceeded to furiously shake him, asking why the 'goddess of beauty herself' was hugging him. Luffy simply laughed and told his furious cook that it was a secret, before pulling out the key and holding it up to Zoro and Sanji with a blatant I-told-you-so look on his face, before putting the key back into his pocket and detaching himself from his cook.

"Let's go." He yelled, sprinting towards Ace's handcuffed form, kneeling on top of the execution tower.

It was at that moment that Sengoku decided that Marine Fleet Admirals didn't have to stick to timetables, and he ordered Ace's immediate execution.

The Mugiwara force and the Whitebeard pirates stared in horror as the executioners' swords swung back and descended towards Ace's neck. They were distracted by a terrible scream and their heads snapped towards the source of the voice.

"**STOP IT!" **Luffy screamed as a large wave of something spread out from his still form, leaving the pirates untouched and knocking most of the weaker marines unconscious, including the executioners, who fell to the ground in a dead faint, their swords dropping harmlessly on the platform next to Ace.

Luffy panted slightly, before turning to Zoro and Sanji and shrugging. They shrugged back and continued to sprint towards the tower.

They soon had to stop though, when a giant sea quake ripped through the island, tilting it to and fro, unfortunately the sea quake was repelled by Sengoku before it could hit the execution tower, it was at that point that the encircling walls rose, blocking their view of Ace.

Luffy stared at the wall, before turning to Sanji and Zoro and stating, "We're going to blast right through that wall. We'll hit it with our strongest attacks, first Zoro, then Sanji and finally me, don't hold back."

"Yes Captain." They grinned evilly, as all three of them stood facing the wall.

Zoro held his arms in front of him, before crossing them over at his chest and intoning "KIKI KYUTORYU…." Letting his demonic aura cover his body, as four more arms and two more heads materialised on his body, giving him the impression that he was holding nine swords, one in each of his six hands and three mouths.

"….ASURA…." He intoned, shooting towards the wall, all six hands outstretched, " ICHIBUGIN!" He yelled, slicing the wall and creating nine huge criss-crossed slashes, weakening the wall, but not breaking it.

Zoro straightened from his kneeling position by the wall, letting his extra limbs fade from view as he and Sanji exchanged places and clapped hands saying "MY/YOUR turn."

Sanji removed his smoke, crushing it underfoot before inspecting the wall and picking out the weakest point as his target, he then began to furiously spin on his left leg, becoming a black blur. After a few moments he stopped spinning, standing with his red hot left leg raised, his hands raised either side of his face. "DIABLE JAMBE…." He growled as he, too, shot forward "….FLAMBERGE SHOT!" He yelled, unleashing a series of super heated, hot and fast kicks that produced large spider web like cracks in the wall and created a small hole in the middle of the crater.

He dropped down and inspected the damage before turning and clapping hands with Luffy and going to stand a good distance away, next to Zoro.

Luffy stared at the wall before raising his thumb to his lips, only to turn slightly towards his first-mate and cook, saying "Zoro, Sanji I'm going to use IT."

Zoro and Sanji nodded before moving further away, but they also understood the hidden message behind their Captain's words, he was telling them to look after him when he was in his weaker form.

Luffy brought both of his thumbs to his mouth and intoned "GEAR THIRD: HONE FUUSEN…" as he blew into them, inflating them to giant proportions, he cocked both of his giant fists back and yelled out "GOMU GOMU NO…" as he stated to swing them faster and faster until they were just giant flesh coloured blurs. "GIGANT GATTLING!" He roared as his fists pummelled into the wall, smashing away at the rock and leaving huge craters where he hit. A huge cloud of smoke, dust and rubble obscured him from view as he let out on final punch, then the wall started to shake as it collapsed, the dust quickly blew away to reveal a huge hole in the wall and a miniature sized Luffy, who was quickly snatched up by Sanji so that the Marines couldn't take advantage of his momentary weakness.

As soon as Luffy was full sized, a few minutes later, the monster trio set off again, sprinting through the new hole in the wall and heading straight for the execution tower. Not caring that the rest of fighters were staring at them in shock and awe, after having watched them easily punch through one of Marineford's strongest defences.

They were all snapped out of their awe a few seconds later by Sengoku's next words,

"DON'T LET THESE ROOKIES CONTROL THIS WAR!" He shouted, his voice echoing around Marineford through the speakers.

Sanji snorted, "Bit late for that…and since when were they letting us?"

"THIS FORCE COULD BE DANGEROUS!"

"No shit." Zoro cut in.

"ESPECIALLY THEIR COMMANDER -"

"What clued them in?" Sanji wondered sarcastically.

"- MONKEY D LUFFY -"

"Well done," Luffy clapped, voice dripping with sarcasm that he didn't know he had, "You know my name, you want an award for that or something?"

Zoro and Sanji snorted.

"- WHO IS THE BIOLOGICAL SON OF THE REVOLUTIONARY, DRAGON!"

"And the shit just hit the fan!" Zoro, Sanji and Luffy exclaimed, laughing their heads off as they continued to run towards the execution tower and their final 'wall' before they could get to Ace, Sengoku; the Admirals were currently being kept busy by Enel and a variety of the Whitebeard commanders and Garp had been distracted and had left a while ago – something about a female monster trio -, so Sengoku was the final barrier.

Or…..so he thought, but when the monster trio leapt at him, only to spring away from him and land at the bottom of the tower, he knew that something had happened and he had missed it, and, coupled with an ominous click, a happy sounding whoop and (when he turned towards the sounds) a missing executee, well something in his plan had gone horribly wrong. Ace was free and the monster trio hadn't come within 3 metres of him. What the hell had happened?!

_Flashback – _

_While Luffy was pounding the wall to pieces, Sanji had contacted Nami using the baby den den mushi and had soon discovered that she was only a few feet away from him, hidden in plain sight with Robin using Mirage tempo. Sanji had also found out that Franky was currently disabling the wall and would be done soon, but he didn't care about that. He, Nami and Robin had come up with a small plan to free Ace without having to get anywhere near the tower. All they needed was the key._

_And later when Sanji scooped up mini-Luffy he told his captain and Zoro the plan and gave the key to Nami and Robin discretely. All they had to do was distract Sengoku for a few moments and let the girls do the rest._

_End of Flashback _

Luffy, Zoro and Sanji grinned and the pirates all cheered as Ace landed safely at the bottom of the execution tower. Luffy desperately wanted to hold onto his brother and never let go, but even he knew that this wasn't the best time for a brotherly reunion, so settled himself to beaming up at his brother with a shit-eating grin plastered firmly on his face.

Seeing that Luffy was a little distracted, Sanji elbowed his captain sharply and clicked his fingers twice. Luffy's eyes widened as he realised that he had forgotten the signal and took a deep breath to ready himself for it, since he had rubber lungs, he could shout louder than any normal human could and his shout would echo across the battlefield, alerting his allies to the retreat.

Sanji, Zoro and Ace quickly ran away plugging their ears as their sprinted away from Luffy at top speed – they knew how loud Luffy could shout and you didn't want to be anywhere near him when he did – as they waited for the inevitable explosion.

"MARINE ADMIRALS ARE EGOTISTICAL BASTARDS!"  Luffy screamed at the top of his lungs, drawing the attention of all of the Marines to himself and allowing his allies to slip away unnoticed in the chaos, caused by all of the die-hard marines swarming at him to pummel him for his comment about the Admirals.

Luffy just laughed at the idiocy of the marines and waited until most of them were inside of the wall, before stretching his arms to grab hold of the – now collapsing – wall and rocketing himself towards the – now unfrozen thanks to Ace – bay.

He was almost in the clear when Akainu appeared in mid-air next to him and smacked him out of the sky with a magma punch straight to the chest.

The Straw –hats, Mugiwara force, Whitebeard pirates and Ace watched in horror as Luffy went flying into the ground, smacking into the concrete and ice to create a large crater. They stood in shock as Luffy struggled to get up from the crater, his chest was badly cut and burnt where he had been punched and they screamed out at their ally/captain/brother as Akainu raised a fist to deliver a finishing blow.

The blow never came, it was blocked by a crackling lightning hand and golden staff infused with Haki, the rest of the pirates sighed in relief as Akainu's fist was blocked by Enel, who wasted no time for pleasantries, blasting Akainu back with a sharp swing of his Haki infused staff, and scooping up Luffy before speeding away in a flash of lightning.

Once they were aboard the Sunny, the retreat was set in motion as all of the ships turned away from the battle and sailed away, using both the wind and their paddles to get away as fast as possible.

Once they were a safe distance away, they all relaxed and set about treating the injured and re-uniting with their crew-members. Luffy was the first to get treated and, after Chopper and Law had wrapped him in a ton of aloe Vera paste, antiseptic and bandages, he was carefully given to Ace, with strict instructions that he should get a lot of sleep and no stressful movements for at least three days.

Ace, after being treated by the Whitebeard nurses, happily carried his unconscious little brother onto the Moby Dick and below deck; neither of them were seen for the next 12 hours.

Meanwhile, once they were treated, the temporary allies of the Mugiwara armada started to drift off in their own directions, though a few stayed, and ,after writing small messages to their former commander and leaving them with Zoro, they thanked Chopper, Law and the nurses for treating them and sailed away peacefully.

The only ones to stay in the end, and the ones to greet Luffy when he and Ace emerged from the Moby Dick half a day later, were Hancock and Jimbe along with the Whitebeard and Straw-hat pirates of course, who rushed over to Luffy, checking him over for any places where he may have bled through his bandages, all the while Luffy giggled (and yawned) at their worried faces.

And although both crews pretended they didn't notice, while Luffy was bouncing around the Sunny with Chopper and Usopp and Ace was mucking around with Marco and Jimbe, they couldn't help but smile at the protective and loving glances that Luffy and Ace would share when they thought that no-one was looking.

Both crews had fun while they were together, even if it was only for a week, but like all good things, it had to come to an end, and the brothers had to say their goodbyes, screaming at each other from their respective ships that were quickly getting further and further away from one another.

"I'M GONNA DO IT ACE!" Luffy exclaimed, throwing his fists into the air, "I'M GOING TO BE PIRATE KING!"

"I KNOW YOU WILL BRAT!" Ace screams back, with a hint of fondness in his voice, "I'LL SEE YOU IN THE NEW WORLD!"

It would have been a touching scene, but, like most of the touching scenes between the two brothers, one of them had to spoil it.

"YEAH SEE YOU AT THE PIRATE'S SUMMIT! AND DON'T MAKE ME SAVE YOUR ASS AGAIN!"

"IDIOT! THAT'S MY LINE!"

"WHO WAS THE ONE WHO GOT CAPTURED?!"

"LIKE YOU'VE NEVER BEEN CAPTURED BEFORE!"

"I WAS SEVEN!"

"THAT'S NO EXCUSE!"

"YOU'RE 13 YEARS OLDER THAN I WAS THEN! YOU HAVE NO EXCUSE EITHER!"

"SAYS THE GUY WHO WAS CAPTURED BY A NO-NAME WEAKLING!"

"I WAS SEVEN! YOU'RE TWENTY! LOOK AT TE AGE GAP!"

"AND HOW MANY TIMES HAVE YOU BEEN CAPTURED?! FOURTY….MAYBE EVEN FIFTY TIMES!"

"SAYS THE GUY WHO FELL ASLEEP AND GOT KIDNAPPED!"

"THAT WAS ONE TIME! _ONE!_ YOU'VE DONE THAT ATLEAST TEN TIMES!"

"HAVE NOT!"

"HAVE TOO!"

"HAVE NOT!"

"HAVE TOO!"

"HAVE NOT"

"HAVE TOO!"

Both crews sighed as they dragged their furious captain/ division commander away from the railing before they could break anything. Neither crew noticed the small smiles that the brother's exchanged before they were dragged back into the ship or the wordless promises to see each other soon and the small 'I love you' s that they mouthed at each other. Because, even if they always acted silly and stupid all the time, there was always an underlying seriousness to their actions. Maybe all brothers were like that, or maybe not, maybe it was just a 'D' thing, or maybe the two of them were just weird. But in the end they had their crews and they had each other, and that was all that mattered to them.

Well…..

…..that and meat!

**END**

**A/N: Don't know where this came from. Sorry if the ending is a bit sudden but I really needed to finish this and although I'm not all that happy with it, I've decided to post it anyway in that hopes that maybe one person might enjoy it. The name means armada. **

**Review please!**

**Tenebrae XD**


	11. Deal

**A/N: I am so sorry for not updating sooner, but school is being a bitch and I have half a ton of homework to do. You can expect a flurry of updates in a day or so though, I'm currently working on several stories and most of them are almost done, so be patient please. But for now enjoy this little ficlet. REVIEW PLEASE!**

**WARNING: A lot of swearing. I mean A LOT. Luffy is very OOC in this, but his brother died so…cut some slack. Reviews are appreciated. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own One Piece, if the world were only that kind….sigh….**

**Deal**

"FUCKING COWARD! COME DOWN HERE RIGHT NOW AND EXPLAIN THIS! IF YOU DON'T COME DOWN HERE IN 10 SECONDS I WILL COME UP THERE AND DRAG YOU DOWN BY YOUR FUCKING TEETH!"

The marines and pirates alike had watched as Portgas D Ace, the one that they had come to save, was killed saving his little brother. Now they understood that Mugiwara would be upset…no distraught, maybe even mentally damaged…..well, more than he already was….but this…

"COME DOWN HERE YOU FAT UGLY BASTARD AND LET ME RIP YOU TO SHREDS, YOU FUCKING LIAR!"

…..

…..

…..this was madness. Mugiwara no Luffy had been shouting at the sky for a few minutes now, just what he was shouting at….nobody knew, but whoever it was, they sincerely hoped that he would come down soon, Mugiwara was getting more and more insane by the minute and soon he might be angry enough to vent his anger on them…..

"I DIDN'T WANT TO HAVE TO DO THIS, BUT YOU'VE LEFT ME NO CHOICE! IF YOU DON'T COME HERE RIGHT NOW THEN THE TAPE I HAVE OF YOUR 2 MILLIONTH BIRTHDAY PARTY IS GOING TO GET BROADCASTED ACROSS THE WORLD!"

CRACK

BOOM

A huge cloud of dust flew out from where Mugiwara had been standing over Ace's body and obscured them from the view of the marines, pirates and den den mushi. When the dust cleared a tall man was looming over Mugiwara, he was intimidating to say the least, and the very air seemed to thicken around him, making it impossible to breathe. How Mugiwara was still standing that close to him, when they were 10 metres away and could still feel the effects, they would never know.

But the man seemed uneasy, and for good reason,

"What do you call this?!" Mugiwara ground out, furiously gesturing at Ace's body underneath him.

"Ummmm….." The man tried to reply, but Mugiwara cut him off.

"We had a DEAL! WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS?!"

"Ace's corpse."

"And why is Ace a corpse?!" Mugiwara demanded.

"Because…."

"Yes?!" Mugiwara ground out, prompting the man to finish the sentence.

"…I fell asleep at the mirror…"

"And…"

"…and the Fates got a little carried away and theycutAce'sthread." The man rushed out the last few words, obviously trying to get himself some extra time, but Mugiwara wasn't buying it.

"They did WHAT?!" Mugiwara roared.

"It was an accident!" The man tried to reason. Marines and pirates alike all flinched, wrong thing to say, this man must have no tact at all to say this to Mugiwara of all people.

"ACCIDENT?!" They all flinched again, Mugiwara was going to tear him a new one at this rate.

"MY BROTHER IS DEAD BECAUSE OF THIS 'ACCIDENT' YOU TURD-LIKE BOOK-WORMISH CONCEITED SMELLY-CROTCHED DICK!"

Everyone on the battlefield winced, and the man started to look incredibly uncomfortable, but Mugiwara wasn't done.

"YOU ARE A PUS-SUCKING VACILLATING GRANDIOSE FULL O'YOURSELF BUTT-LICKING PRICK! IF YOUR BRAINS WERE DYNAMITE THERE WOULDN'T BE ENOUGH TO LIGHT A CIGARETTE! I SHOULD JUST CASTRATE YOU RIGHT NOW AND PREVENT YOUR IDIOCY FROM SPREADING; YOU'RE AS THICK AS MANURE AND BARELY HALF AS USEFUL! SO GO LET A CARPATHIAN LONG-HAIRED SHE-WOLF BLOW YOUR DICK, YOU GRANDFATHER-FUCKING SHITHEAD!"

'Ouch' was the general thought around the world after Mugiwara's words, the man looked even more uncomfortable now than he was before, it that was possible.

"Luffy…" The man said. Mugiwara scowled at the familiar name but let him continue, "…what can I do to tell you I'm sorry….and possibly get that tape back?"

Mugiwara smirked; the fighters suddenly had a very bad feeling about this.

"There are a few things that could make me forgive you and give you the tape. But there's one that you couldn't possibly do, so that's out of the question." Mugiwara stated, baiting the man.

"Luffy, you know me, I could do it, tell me what it is." The man replied.

"I want my brothers back." Mugiwara said.

Now most people hadn't noticed that Mugiwara had said _brothers _but the few that did pitied the pirate.

"Done, they'll be up in 10 minutes, don't worry the one who has been there the longest has been training in the afterlife, and all of his new skills will carry over into his new body." The man said while everyone blinked in surprise; huh it couldn't be that simple….this was raising the dead they were talking about here, not making a cup of coffee!

"Oh and two more things, please~." Mugiwara added as the man turned to leave.

"Okay, but that's it. And I want that tape as soon as you (and your brothers) are safe and out of Marine range." The man sighed.

Mugiwara whispered his choices into the man's ear, or at least they thought that they were his choices….it was hard to tell from this far away, and the man nodded slightly before giving Mugiwara a big hug and disappearing in another dust cloud. Silence consumed the battlefield for a few moments before

POOF

Three clouds of white smoke appeared around Mugiwara and Ace's body, when the clouds cleared Mugiwara was standing next to three tall forms. The smoke revealed a tall blond man wearing an long split tailed blue coat, with black shorts, a scarf around his neck, black boots and a top hat with a pair of blue goggles strapped to it, he was also carrying a long metal pole. The second form was revealed to be the second commander himself, Portgas D Ace, completely unscathed and with his hat, dagger and boots back, his 'dead' corpse had disappeared from the ground but the blood still remained, as a reminder that this was real. The third form, was wearing a white cooks outfit, had a smug grin and brown hair shaped curiously into a quiff of sorts….wait….was that…

"THATCH?!" Portgas shouted in surprise.

"ACE?! LUFFY?!" The blond haired man cried.

"SABO?!" Portgas turned to the blond….Sabo.

"WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?!" All three of them yelled, directing their questions at the only one who wasn't confused by all of this….Mugiwara.

"I'll explain later." Mugiwara said, before promptly keeling over sideways in an exhausted faint. Fortunately, he fell right next to Thatch who easily caught the unconscious pirate and passing him to Portgas and Sabo, who fawned over their little brother for a few seconds before Portgas lifted Mugiwara over his shoulder and they all set off on an insane sprint to their allies.

At this point, Akainu remembered that these were the pirates that he was supposed to kill, and he sprinted after them, unfortunately (for his ego) he was unable to catch up with the pirates after his slip in concentration had allowed them a head start. He settled for throwing giant balls of lava at the fleeing pirates, not a single one hit, all of them were easily deflected by Sabo, who looked very smug about this fact.

At this point Blackbeard arrived with his crew, told Sengoku he was leaving the Shichibukai, waved his hand at Whitebeard, looked incredibly shocked and the ordered a retreat. Weird….at this point in time very few noticed the smug smile that Mugiwara revealed before falling back into unconsciousness. Ace, who had noticed, merely shrugged and carried on running.

XXX

Not one of the fighters could tell you how it had happened, but all the pirates had somehow managed to retreat to one of the ships and before they knew it, all of the pirates were miles away, just a dot on the horizon, carrying with them the whole cause of the war in the first place.

XXX

On the Moby Dick…..

Ace and Thatch had been crowded by the whole crew and Whitebeard upon arrival and were currently being hugged to death by all of their siblings, who were overjoyed to have their brothers back. No-one was happier than Marco, except maybe Luffy or Whitebeard, who had immediately glomped both Ace and Thatch and had drawn them into a bone crushing hug, happily humming the whole time.

Meanwhile Sabo had taken Luffy over to a quiet corner on the deck and was lying on his back with Luffy curled up on his chest, both sleeping quietly. So when Ace wandered over 20 minutes later, after freeing himself from the crowd, he was met by the adorable sight of his brothers quietly sleeping while clutching at each other, Luffy's small hands were fisted into Sabo's coat, and Sabo's arm was wrapped around his little brother's waist. Ace was startled out of his thoughts when Sabo lazily opened one eye and patted the deck next to him with his free hand. Ace needed no further prompting, laying his head on Sabo's shoulder and curling into his twin brother, smiling slightly when he felt Sabo's hand curl round his waist and Luffy's hand slip into his own. And all three brothers quickly drifted back to sleep.

XXX

They were woken up by the sound of giggling and a flash of light nearly 15 hours later, well two of them were anyway - Luffy just carried on sleeping, ignoring the pathetic attempts to wake him up – Ace and Sabo grumbled at the unwanted awakening and glared at the idiot who had dared to wake them up….Only to come face to face with Boa Hancock armed with a camera, they scowled and tightened their hold on their little brother when she made motions to take him from them, only for their hands to come into contact with something sticky, alarmed they looked down at their little brother only to find him covered in what looked like honey.

….

….

….Why was Luffy covered in honey?! Sabo glared at Hancock, spotting an innocent half empty jar standing to the side of her, following his brother's gaze, Ace also noticed the innocent jar; he put two and two together and snatched the camera away from the still giggling woman. Ace and Sabo went through the camera's album and were disturbed at what they found….almost all the pictures were of Luffy, in various situations. There were even a few of him getting changed…'this woman's a pervert' they thought, finally they saw the pictures of Luffy covered in honey and they snapped, well Ace did.

Sabo sighed as he worked on cleaning the honey off of his little brother while using his other hand to restrain his twin, as Ace attempted to gut the female Shichibukai while spouting curses that would make wallpaper curl. None of these had any effect on the crew – they had heard Luffy's after all – who were calmly watching the morning entertainment. Once Ace had calmed down, thanks to several pictures on the camera portraying Luffy in cute positions, he helped Sabo to clean off all of the honey ("what was that woman thinking?! What if it had got into one of his injuries?!") and settled for cuddling Luffy, conversing with Sabo and sending the 'perverted woman' death glares every five seconds.

This continued for several hours, that is, until Luffy (finally) woke up. What happened next could only be described as a vicious tug of war between Ace and Hancock, both grabbing one of Luffy's arms and pulling whilst screaming profanities at their opponent; this tug of war lasted for another half an hour and was only ended when Luffy woke up enough to realise that his brothers were back and burst into tears.

Shocked, Hancock released Luffy, who went flying into Ace and Sabo, sending all three of them into the wall, before landing in a heap at the bottom. Luffy sat on his two brothers and cried, all the while the crew (and Hancock) looked on gobsmacked, this kid, one of the top pirate rookies, who had just blackmailed a seriously powerful man into returning his brothers and Thatch to him, was sitting on his brothers' chests bawling his eyes out…..WTF!

While the crew and Hancock tried to connect the image of a crying Luffy with the scary image of him from yesterday and his title of the second strongest rookie pirate, Ace and Sabo hurriedly tried to calm their hysterical little brother and - after many hugs , kisses, whispered conversations and yells of 'don't just kill me off' countered with 'you actually died' and 'Ace show some tact for once' – Luffy finally calmed down and lay limply sprawled across his brothers' laps, emotionally and physically exhausted from the reunion with his brothers and the fight the previous day.

"Lu?" Ace asked, combing his fingers through his little brother's hair.

"Mmm?" Luffy mumbled, evidently enjoying Ace's ministrations.

"What exactly happened yesterday?" Ace continued.

Luffy froze, "We made a deal and he broke his side of it." He said stiffly, before perking up and reaching into his jeans pocket and pulling out a weird fruit and tossing it at Thatch – who looked at the devil fruit in his hands in awe,

"And _what_ was the deal and just _who_ did you make it with?" Sabo prompted gently.

"And where did you get this?" Thatch added in, holding the fruit as if it was made of gold, which, considering what it was, it was worth the same amount either way.

"There is no grilled meat without fire and the fire can't be lit without a box of matches, until I have the matches I can't grill the meat." Luffy replied, sounding a bit like he was quoting a cooking book.

"…."

"Did anyone else not get a word of that?" Thatch asked, and was rewarded with many nods of agreement.

"I got it," Sabo and Ace replied in sync, "Luffy won't tell us anything until this man arrives."

"Oh and getting Blackbeard's devil fruit was part of the deal as well." Luffy added as an afterthought.

"I could kiss you right now." Thatch cooed.

"Don't you dare." Ace and Sabo growled, glaring daggers at the resurrected cook.

"I'm still not telling you anything." Luffy pointed out.

"I guess we'll have to wait until this man gets here then." One of the crew members sighed.

"No need he's already here." A smooth voice interrupted.

Weapons were directed at the voice, Ace's hand burst into flames and Sabo's staff appeared out of nowhere, Luffy just glanced at the man before saying,

"You gonna come over, or do I hafta drag ya?" He grumbled, yawning, and startling the crew and his brothers slightly.

The man chuckled and ignored the weapons directed at him and walked smoothly over to where Luffy was sprawled and cautiously, since Ace and Sabo were still glaring at him and he did not want to be beaten and burnt alive, sat down opposite the 3 brothers, smiling slightly when Luffy waved at him from his position 2 yards away from him.

"Yo, Des!" Luffy chirped tiredly, waving at the man…..evidently called Des.

"Luffy, you okay?" Des chirped back, weirding out the crew, someone that scary _shouldn't __**chirp.**_

"Tired. Whadayawant." Luffy yawned, slurring his words.

"The tape, for a start, and then your end of the deal." Des stated in a no nonsense tone.

Luffy stretched, cat-like, on Ace's lap before reaching into his back pocket and pulling out a small metal disk and stretching his arm to deposit it in Des' lap. Des simply blinked and picked up the disk, inspecting it with a long look before slipping it into his shirt pocket with a goofy grin on his face.

"Now….your end of the deal please." Des grinned.

"Do I have to do it now?" Luffy whined, a small pout on his face, "I'm tired."

"Yes….and you're the girl this time."

"Fine." Luffy groaned, leaving Ace's lap and stretching, before leading the way through the open door and into the hallway, towards the cabins on the Moby Dick. Des exchanged a gleeful look with the rest of the crew before practically skipping after the smaller teen, humming a gleeful tune as he flew through the door and slammed it shut behind him.

The rest of the pirates, including Sabo and Ace sat in silence for a few minutes before the weight of Des' words hit them, 'you're the girl this time' he'd said…

…girl….this….time…

"Luffy!" Ace screamed, rocketing up off the deck with Sabo close behind him, a look of panic on both their faces.

"Luffy, stay away from that bastard!" Ace screamed, his mind jumping to the worst conclusion, as he and his 'twin' raced through the door and after their little brother.

Meanwhile Des and Luffy had, finally, made it to one of the more deserted rooms (that contained a large empty space and some long curtains) and were in the middle of preparing for their _usual_ activity…..although most would not consider this usual or a real activity…..but to them, it was.

"What should I put on this time?" Luffy asked wearily, suppressing a yawn.

"Hmmm…the thing in the black bag…..and the red thing that you wore last time." Des chirped, motioning to the black bag that seemed to have appeared from no-where.

Luffy nodded and went behind one of the opaque curtains to change, quickly and quietly slipping into the outfit through practice, gained from trying to not alert his crew when Des met him once a month. He emerged a few minutes later, casually ignoring Des' wolf whistle, and walked into the middle of the room, one hand on his hip as he waited for Des to get changed so that they could get this over with. Des also slipped behind the curtains to change, emerging seconds later fully dressed in his new outfit.

Luffy pouted, "I hate it when you do that, it makes the rest of us seem as slow as snails."

"And that's why I do it." Des grinned.

Luffy pouted again, but relented, experience had taught him that arguing with Des was a bad idea; the older man could talk non-stop for hours and that gave him migraines, he'd never thought that he could be out talked by someone before he'd met Des and by then it was too late. Sighing, Luffy stood still as Des joined him in the middle of the room and placed one hand on his hips and the other wrapped around his hand. Luffy responded by placing his free hand on Des' shoulder and they both stood for a few seconds while they waited for their imaginary cue.

At the same time barely 15 metres away, Ace and Sabo were furiously running in and out of the Moby Dick's many rooms, cursing when they opened many a door and were met with an empty room. They ran haphazardly through dozens of doors, cursing all the while, until Ace suddenly stopped and almost slapped himself. Sabo stopped too, concern written on his face, he didn't know why Ace was suddenly banging his head against the wall but he could guess.

"Sensory Haki?" Sabo asked quietly.

"Yeah. I don't know why I didn't think to use it before; it could've saved _so_ much time and effort." Ace moaned, leaning against the wall.

"It's okay," Sabo soothed, "I didn't think of it until now either, and banging your head on the wall is not going to help us to find Luffy."

"Right let's find our little brother!" Ace yelled, activating his Haki and instantly shooting along the corridor and round the corner, Sabo hot on his heels, twisting through the corridors until they finally came to a large blackish door. They wasted no time and immediately slammed through it, almost blowing it off its hinges in their haste to get to their brother. What they saw only increased their doubts about their little brother being anywhere near this 'Des.'

"Yo Sabo, Ace." Luffy chirped, somewhat tiredly, "D'ya wanna watch or somethin'."

"…um…..you…what….are…..you….." Sabo stuttered, blushing cherry red, but was beaten to the punch by Ace.

"Luffy! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU WEARING?!" Ace yelled, trying to hide his blush, unsuccessfully, behind his hand.

"Eh?" Luffy looked confused, cutely tilting his head to the side, "What d'you mean?"

"He means, 'why are you wearing a dress'." Des explained, "And the answer to that is; it's part of the deal."

"What kind of pervert are you? Making Luffy cross-dress?!" Ace snapped, looking at the short black cocktail dress that Luffy was currently wearing, accompanied with a red sash around his waist and his usual straw-hat, Ace had to admit that his little brother _did_ look cute.

"I need a dance partner and Luffy has the right build to be the girl." Des shrugged.

"Oi! I do not look like a girl!" Luffy yelled, pouting slightly – which didn't help his case in the least, as it only served to make him look cuter.

"Of course you don't." Sabo soothed, ever the tactful brother, brushing past Ace and walking over to stand in the middle of the room next to Luffy.

"Now," Sabo continued, this time addressing Des, "If you don't mind, we are taking Luffy," he said, scooping Luffy up and turning back to Ace, "And are going to let him have a nap."

"Why?" Des asked, pouting, "He has to do his part of the deal."

"He can do it some other time." Sabo pointed out.

"Besides," Ace joined in, "He's obviously tired and he can't dance well if he's half-asleep."

Ace's point was reinforced by the small snores that were filling the room, courtesy of Luffy, who was fast asleep with his head nuzzled into Sabo's shoulder. Des sighed and admitted defeat,

"Fine, but he has to stay in the dress for the rest of the day!" He cried triumphantly.

"What?!" Ace cried out, only to be shushed by Sabo when his loud shout caused Luffy to shift in his sleep, "You can't."

"Not optional." Des snapped before disappearing in a cloud of dust and, unnoticed at the time, taking Luffy's clothes with him.

Ace and Sabo sighed, resigning themselves to protecting Luffy from perverts who liked cross dressing all day, and walked out of the room, carrying the sleeping teen with them and making their way back up to the deck. Where, upon arrival, they had to deal with a perverted female Shichibukai armed with a camera and over a hundred incredulous looks, not helped by the fact that Luffy's dress barely covered his ass and upper thighs.

Three hours later when Luffy woke up again, he took one look at the blushes on the faces of most of the pirates on deck and promptly started to sulk, muttering furiously,

"I hate Des now, I made deal with the devil and he makes me cross dress."

"I don't blame you, stupid pervert…." Ace began to furiously mutter under his breath about 'castration', 'grilled perverts' and 'his balls are next.'

Sabo sweat dropped at Ace's comments before turning to his little brother and asking,

"So what was that about a deal with the devil?"

Luffy groaned.

**END**

**A/N: Cookies for anyone who can figure out who 'DES' really is. REVIEW PLEASE!**


	12. Bestia

_A/N: This is a different devil fruit Luffy fic. It's only a one shot….though I may write more of them if it's well received. Luffy is OOC in this….and pretty powerful, even without Haki….but it's mainly due to his devil fruit ability. Now about a third of the way through writing this, I realised that it was going to be huge, but bear with it please. You can flame me afterwards if you utterly hate it…..now enjoy! (I hope.) _

**Bestia**

_**There are three things that you must remember when dealing with Monkey D Luffy: **_

_**Number one…..Never mess with his friends…..**_

"RRRRROOOOOBBBBIIIINNNN!"

This was the sound that echoed through Enies Lobby the day that Nico Robin was supposed to be executed, this was also the cry of one furious pirate captain whose archaeologist had been kidnapped and was going to be executed.

Said furious pirate captain was currently standing on top of the courthouse, pondering whether to wait for his crew or span the chasm below and get to Robin then and there. His decision was made for him as one by one his crew arrived on the roof of the courthouse. Nami and Chopper were blasted up through a hole that Zoro had made while he was making his own way up, whilst trying not to get lost in the process. Sanji kicked up through the roof just after Zoro had climbed up through the hole he had made and Usopp (or Sogeking as he was calling himself at the moment) flew onto the roof, landing in a crumpled heap in the concrete.

Luffy didn't look at his crew as they walked in V formation to join him in standing on the edge of the courthouse, staring up at their captured crewmate and the CP9, who merely stared back at them.

Luffy was already furious, these _marines_ had tried to take away one of his nakama, one of his pack! His temper was already skyrocketing, and it just got worse, when they heard Robin's tale, about the Buster call that destroyed her home, how she wanted to die because she thought that they would abandon her, that they would leave her behind. _Bullshit!_ He would never leave a pack member behind, NEVER! Luffy held back his anger and comments though, he waited for Robin to finish her tale, he stood shaking in rage as Spandam told him that they could never hope to oppose the world government, that it was inevitable that Robin was going to die, because the world government was too strong. That was the final straw, Luffy snapped.

"Sogeking," he said, voice deceptively calm, "make that flag burn."

Usopp obliged, pulling out his pachinko and taking careful aim at the flag, he let the shot loose with a cry of "CERTAIN KILL: FIREBIRD STAR!" And the marines watched as the bird shaped flame rocketed through the flag, sending out a wave of heat as the shot impacted, and a burning hole replacing the world government insignia.

Spandam gaped and shouted furiously at the raging captain, "Look what you've done! Don't think you can survive having the whole world after you!"

"**YOU WANNA BET?!"** Luffy roared, unintentionally releasing a bit of Haki mixed with killing intent, which caught the attention of the CP9, especially a certain leopard zoan.

"ROBIN! I STILL HAVEN'T HEARD YOU SAY IT! SAY YOU WANT TO LIVE!" Luffy roared.

Robin stared at the ground, tears dripping down her cheeks, and a conflicted expression on her face. Luffy waited patiently for her to say it, even if she didn't he would take her back anyway, she was one of his, he never abandoned his own and he never would.

"I WANT TO LIVE!" Robin screamed, as she raised her head and stared at her captain and crew, "TAKE ME OUT TO SEA WITH YOU!"

Luffy smiled, finally he'd heard what he wanted to hear, and he could feel his crew's happiness at Robin's words as well, now all they needed to do was to get her back. It was then that he saw the bridge start to lower, but then he heard the sound of mortar cannons and the bridge stops, barely extended halfway. Luffy almost growled, sure he could ferry his crew over himself, but that would be time consuming and they didn't have any time to waste right now.

He was so conflicted by his thoughts that he barely noticed Franky burn some important looking papers and declare his bet on them rescuing Robin. He _did_ notice when Franky was kicked off of the tower and fell towards the chasm below, and he was just about to wing down and save the cyborg but Kokoro chose that moment to shout through the den den mushi for them all to jump off of the courthouse. With his sensitive ears, Luffy could pick out an _interesting_ sound behind Kokoro's words, deciding to go along with the plan he yelled for his crew to jump as he leapt off the courthouse, plummeting towards the abyss below.

His decision had been the right one; the rocketman crashed through the courthouse gates seconds later, speeding up the bridge to collide with him and his falling crew, then colliding with Franky before crashing through the tower doors and skidding to a stop. A few seconds passed before Luffy pulled himself out of the rubble, stretching slightly, without a single scratch on him. He turned to Franky, who was staring in shock at Kokoro, Chimney and Gonbe, who had only suffered small nosebleeds from the rocketman's crash.

Meanwhile Luffy let his senses roam, searching for Robin's scent, but he couldn't find it. Frowning, he figured that Robin must be further in and that he would find her scent if he explored the area. He was interrupted from his search by Franky, who'd asked him whether or not the crew would be okay after the crash. Luffy smiled, as if his crew could be harmed by a mere crash into several feet worth of granite after slamming into it on a metal train going at full speed,

"They'll be fine," Luffy commented absently, "they're tough."

As if to prove his statement, at that moment all 5 members of his crew rose from the rubble, not a single scratch on any of them, arms raised and battle cries falling from their lips as they showed Luffy and Franky just how tough they really were.

"See," Luffy said, pride layered in his voice, "they're tough."

Franky gawped at the monster crew, known as the Straw hat pirates, who could survive a full on crash without a single scratch, their captain was one thing, but the whole crew as well. 'Amazing' was the only thought going through his head at the moment….well that and 'crazy assed bastards.'

Suddenly Luffy tensed, his senses had picked up something, and he whirled round to face the far corner of the huge entrance hall they were in. The rest of the crew, noticing their captain's actions whirled to face the corner as well, drawing their weapons and getting into their stances, ready to attack if whatever their captain had found was hostile.

Only to be met by a freaky sight; Fukoro was bouncing in mid air and holding a suspicious looking key, while chanting 'chapapapa' in some weird mantra. Luffy growled at him, Robin's scent was still on him, this man had touched Robin, fairly recently by the smell of it, he wanted to rip the bastard apart for touching one of his pack, but restrained himself, just in case this bastard knew anything that could help him get to Robin.

His decision, again, was the right one; soon after the crew had turned their attention to Fukoro he had started to tell them about Robin's sea stone cuffs and how each CP9 member (not including Lucci) had one of 5 keys that could open them. Luffy growled again, his patience wearing thin, as his crew decided who would go after Robin and who would search for the keys. Finally, after what seemed like forever to Luffy, the crew had decided that the six of them, including Franky, would go after the keys, leaving him to go after Spandam, Lucci and Robin.

Luffy was gone before they'd even finished the sentence, tearing through the halls, following Fukoro's scent to the last place that he'd had contact with Robin. From there he followed Robin's fading scent through the halls, down and down through the building. Every once in a while there was a scream or a crash, but none of the screams belonged to any of his nakama so he paid them no mind, he ignored the crashes as well as they had nothing to do with him right now, and kept on running, following Robin's path.

He was forced to stop for a while when Robin's scent vanished at a blank wall, but Chimney and Gonbe chose this point in time to appear out from under a concealed hatch hidden in the floor, blowing away his confusion, and chirping that Spandam had taken Robin and Lucci through the secret passage and under the waterfall, to the other side of the tower. Luffy smiled at them, saying a short thanks before sprinting through the passage way, picking Robin's scent back up, he growled at the fact that her scent was now tainted with blood and picked up his speed, practically flying through the passage way, until he screeched to a halt when Robin's scent stopped, again, but this time at a huge door, a huge _locked_ door.

Luffy growled, again, what was up with all the secret passageways and locked doors it was almost as if they didn't want him to rescue Robin…oh yeah they didn't. He rubbed his temples, annoyed despite the fact that this was to be expected, but he really didn't want to deal with this shit right now, he had a job to do….speaking of a job…..He turned back to the door and stared at it with a destructive gleam in his eyes, time for the door to go boom.

XXX

A little way away, Chimney and Gonbe crouched behind a crate, hidden from view. They watched as pirate nii-san used a technique that he called gear third to completely destroy the door, turning it into rubble. But the cloud of dust kicked up by the technique prevented them from seeing the actual thing, but they knew that whatever it was it was dangerous and that they should not follow pirate nii-san into the tunnel, or they might not survive the experience. So when pirate nii-san ran into the tunnel, practically glowing with fury, Chimney and Gonbe remained outside. They then decided to go and find Franky; they could help him to get to the tunnel, then _he_ could go after the scary pirate nii-san. After all, they may be reckless but they were certainly not stupid.

XXX

Luffy ran through the tunnel, furious, he could smell Robin's scent, tainted with her blood. He could smell her fear and desperation, he knew that she didn't want to die, that she was waiting for him to come and save her, and he was going to save her alright. Even if he had to destroy this whole island and everyone on it (except his crew and allies) in the process. He sped up when he heard a voice echoing through the tower, and probably the whole of Enies Lobby as well, it was Spandam….he had pressed the golden den den mushi…..he had summoned the Buster Call. Luffy cursed furiously, he ran on, muttering curses all the while, as Spandam was cut off by Robin as she told the whole of Enies Lobby just _what_ the Buster Call really was.

He clenched his teeth when he heard Robin's explanation and cursed the fact that she knew this through personal experience, it riled him up so _so_ much. Luffy just ran faster and faster, ignoring Spandam's callous remarks about how he would be forgiven for the deaths of hundreds of marines, if he simply handed Robin over for execution. 'Not on my watch!' Luffy mentally snarled, he was going to get Robin back, she was one of his. He would get her back.

A few seconds later he slammed through another set of doors, sending the wooden frames flying across the room, emerging in wide storage room and coming face to face with the strongest member of CP9, Lucci.

"Where is Robin?!" Luffy growled out, anger bellying his words.

"She's behind this door." Lucci stated casually, motioning at the door behind him from his position sitting on a large crate.

"Right." Luffy chirped, deceptively happy.

Lucci was taken aback by the happy tone and therefore was not prepared when Luffy suddenly materialised in front of him, in a spectacular show of speed, and booted him in the face with a strong roundhouse kick.

"Now if you could just move out of my way, then I won't have to kick your ass." Luffy continued, still chirping.

Lucci didn't budge, but was surprised with the ferocity of the move and the way that Mugiwara had used his tone to catch him off guard and deal him a decent kick to the face.

"I'm not going to move, I won't let you get through this door." Lucci said calmly, not noticing the way that his opponent's demeanour had changed with those words.

"Okay then…." Luffy shot forwards, slamming his fist into Lucci's stomach, "…. I'll just have to make you move!" He yelled as he began to trade blows with Lucci, neither gaining the upper hand until their fists connected, sending a shockwave of power shooting through the room and blowing both fighters flying away from each other and across the room, towards the walls.

"Get outta my way," Luffy snarled once he had pushed away the metal container that had landed on him, "Robin's through that door, I'm going to get her back."

"It's too late," Lucci smirked from his standing position a few metres away, still in front of the door, "You'll never see her again, it's too late."

"You're wrong, it isn't too late until her head hits the ground, and I'm going after her no matter what you say." Luffy stated calmly, staring at his opponent.

Lucci and Luffy stared at each other for a few seconds, a smirk of the CP9 member's face and a frown on his childish opponent's, the only signs of movement were the almost unnoticeable clenching of Luffy's fists and the widening of Lucci's smirk. They remained like this for several seconds before Luffy shot forward, meeting Lucci in the middle of the room and latching on to the Zoan's arms before whirling round and throwing him into one of the large wooden crates that still lined the room.

Luffy then attempted to make a break for the door, but was thwarted by Lucci who chose that moment to recover from the throw and bodily intercept the pirate, kicking him into a wall and away from the door.

"I've already told you that you're not going to get past me." Lucci growled out.

His reply came in the form of a wooden crate, emerging from the smoke and flying towards him. He lifted his led to kick it away but froze when cracks appeared in the wooden side panel; Luffy broke through the crate to send a flurry of punches at the Zoan. Said Zoan dodged the punches with ease and the pair continued their fight, exchanging blows in a storm of kicks and punches, until finally Lucci got the upper hand and sent Luffy flying across the room to slam into the floor.

"It's useless, you can't win and that woman will die." Lucci said with an air of smugness, his back to his opponent.

Luffy panted, his arm wrapped around his stomach where Lucci had kicked him. He went to tell Lucci how wrong he was when a new smell hit his senses, one of cola and gunpowder as opposed to Lucci's own feathers (from the pigeon that had flown off somewhere) and fur scent, he could instantly tell whose scent this was, it was Franky's. Luffy's brain whirred, is he could keep Lucci occupied, even for a few minutes, if he could get Franky through those doors, then Franky could save Robin while he held Lucci at bay.

Plan in mind, Luffy flew towards the CP9 member, letting loose a harsh set of linked punches and kicks, each move flowing into another, his mind set on drawing Lucci's attention away from the doorway where Franky would emerge in a few seconds. Lucci didn't notice this tactic as he hadn't sensed Franky yet and kept all of his attention on Luffy.

As Luffy had predicted, Franky emerged seconds later and Luffy sent him a discrete look, flashing from Franky to the door and back. Thankfully Franky received the message and began to quickly and quietly edge around the two combatants, trying desperately not to draw Lucci's attention away from his opponent and onto the new presence in the room. Luckily for Luffy, Lucci didn't detect Franky's presence until the cyborg was about a metre away from the door and by then it was too late for the Zoan to do anything and Franky had already rushed through the door by the time Lucci had even begun to make a move towards him.

Luffy let a smug smile flash across his face, his idiot opponent had let himself be distracted by his enemy and had paid the price for it. Franky was now safely through the doors and Lucci was stuck here, still fighting him.

Lucci growled, he had become lax and the pirate had used it to his advantage and that cyborg had managed to get past him and through the doors. He needed to up his game and defeat Mugiwara now, then he could go through the doors and intercept the rat that had got past him before he even had the chance to rescue the woman.

Lucci then realised that they needed more space for what he was about to do, so he shot upwards, using his moon walk to shoot through the opening in the ceiling. But not before he blew the wall open, splashing sea water into the store room, if he could drown his opponent then he wouldn't have to continue this boring fight. It also had the added bonus of blocking the path for anyone who might come down here to try and rescue the woman later. Lucci landed on the upper floor seconds later, this room was above sea level so it would be safe, it was also very spacious and large and would be perfect for fighting in, if Mugiwara had survived that is.

Luffy shot through the hole seconds later, surprising the CP9 member and making the older man absently wonder how the kid had managed to follow him this fast. He shrugged it off a moment later and concentrated on activating his ability so that he could take the pirate down without further delay.

Luffy started, the smell of fur was becoming more potent, his eyes widened as he saw Lucci shift into his Zoan form, becoming at least a head taller and more muscled. His skin was covered in fur and a long tail emerged behind him, Luffy realised that his opponent had probably eaten a leopard devil fruit due to the golden fur, huge muscles and numerous black spots.

Luffy smiled, his opponent was a Zoan, a powerful Zoan, this would be _interesting_.

"Now Mugiwara, let's see your infamous devil fruit abilities, the ones that none of your previous opponents have been able to name. The ones that seem to surpass those of every devil fruit user that you have batted before." Lucci cried with a feral look in his eyes.

"There is a reason for that you know." Luffy replied calmly.

"A reason for what?" Lucci asked, bemused as to why his opponent was having a casual conversation with him in the middle of a fight.

"A reason why none of my previous opponents have been able to name my ability." Luffy continued.

"Oh?" Lucci raised an eyebrow, "And what is this reason?"

"I'll show you!" Luffy yelled, his calm façade shattered as he threw back his head and roared, "Gear Third."

Lucci took a step back as one of Luffy's arms bulged and began to change, he hadn't expected this, he would _never_ in his wildest dreams have expected this. He realised that this kid had been holding back from the start, he readied himself for the huge arm that was flying towards him, intoning "Tekkai" with a sense of unrivalled urgency.

Luffy lifted a giant arm; he was barely using a fifth of his transformation and had concentrated it on one of his arms, he wasn't even in his half form yet but he could practically smell the surprise in Lucci's scent. He absently wondered how his opponent would react if he went into his full form, but quickly snapped back to the fight and sent his huge and furry fist flying straight towards Lucci with a cry of "GIANT-KING'S FIST!"

Lucci didn't dodge (much to Luffy's surprise) and was sent flying into the wall, then out into the air as the walls and ceiling collapsed due to the strength of Luffy's punch, and Lucci slammed into the deck of a marine warship, sliding across the wood to come to a stop next to the railing.

The marines all stared as Lucci flew across the deck, huge form sprawled next to the railing, with smoke and dusk obscuring him from their eyes. The marines soon got over their shock though and quickly levelled their guns at the shadowed form while demanding that the figure identify himself, said shadowed form quickly shrunk back down until it looked distinctly human and emerged from the smoke. Lucci stared at the marines who were _still_ demanding that he tell them who he was, Lucci was 2 seconds away from murdering the lot of them when their Captain told them to shut it.

"Don't you know who this man is?!" He shouted out, pushing his subordinates out of the way to stand a few metres away from the man.

"He's Rob Lucci of the CP9." The Captain stated with a tone of awe.

Instantly the rest of the marines lowered their guns, looks of disbelief and shock etched on their faces, and backed away a few paces. Lucci ignored all of this and focused on the pirate who was standing in the rubble of the tower a hundred or so metres away from him.

Back at the tower Luffy had ended his transformation and was standing in the rubble waiting for an opportunity to catch Lucci off guard, after a few seconds he saw his chance and immediately rocketed forward, shooting across the water and transforming in mid-air. The marines and Lucci stared in shock as great grey and black wings sprouted from Luffy's shoulder blades, catching on the air and lifting him high above the warship with a few powerful thrusts. Ignoring the shocked looks that he was getting, Luffy transformed again, this time his leg sprouted black fur and became more dog like before swelling to gigantic proportions. He raised the giant limb over his head, before letting his wings slide back under his skin, and plummeted down towards the warship with a cry of "GIANT AXE!"

Immediately understanding what his opponent was doing, Lucci sprung off of the deck, using moon walk to retreat a safe distance away before Luffy's leg hit the warship, breaking it in half and sending most of the men overboard. When Luffy realised that Lucci was no longer onboard of the wrecked warship his leg shrunk back to normal size and the thick fur vanished while his wings reappeared, and he began to furiously chase after Lucci's disappearing form.

Meanwhile Lucci was desperately trying to figure out what Luffy's devil fruit ability was, judging from all of the scales, feathers and fur he was a Zoan, but Lucci couldn't think of a single animal that had wings _and_ fur. When he had first seen the fur he had assumed that he had a bear or wolf-ish Zoan form, this theory was quickly thrown out when the wings had appeared. And now he couldn't think of a single animal that had all of the characteristics that Luffy had shown in the fight, it was like a weird riddle _what animal has black fur and grey and black wings?_

He was drawn out of his musings by Luffy when he aimed a kick to his head; Lucci dodged but was caught by another kick aimed at his stomach. Realising that Luffy had the upper hand when it came to aerial combat; Lucci retreated back to the damaged warship, landing lightly on the deck. Luffy followed seconds later, his wings folding back into his skin. Within seconds they were fighting again, smashing through the masts and the steel plating, ignoring the damage that they were inflicting on the ship and focusing solely on their opponents.

After the third mast fell the marines made a wise decision and started to flee from the battle scene, trying to get as far away from the two fighters as they could without abandoning ship altogether. The two fighters themselves paid no attention to the destruction that they were causing, that is, until the other ships around them opened fire on the ship that they were on simultaneously. Both fighters sensed the cannonballs seconds before they hit the ship, and were able to flee from the ship before it was destroyed in a fiery inferno caused by the amount of gunpowder on the ship coupled with the explosions of the cannonballs.

Both fighters landed back on the destroyed tower before migrating to another tower that wasn't as wrecked and only had a few holes in the walls, Lucci dropped lightly to the ground after using moon walk to escape the destruction and Luffy landed opposite him after sliding away his wings that had easily carried him away from the burning ship.

"Seimei Kikan; Kami-E Bushin. This is the end; you can't beat me while I'm in this form." Lucci taunted, before shrinking down slightly, still keeping the general leopard look but loosing the bulk that had slowed him down before.

"You wanna bet." Luffy replied, slipping into a squat and placing one fist on the ground to keep him balanced. Small crackles of energy whispered across his skin, '_Lightning' _Lucci realised with a start, before disappearing under his skin. His body started to steam and his skin had a light blue hue to it, "Gear Second." Luffy growled out before disappearing and then materialising in front of Lucci, fist raised to punch him in, "Jet Pistol!" He cried as Lucci was forcefully punched in the gut and sent flying.

Luffy's eyes widened as Lucci used moon walk to jump out of the way and avoid being sent into the wall, he wasn't surprise when Lucci then used the same technique coupled with soru to speed back to the ground and sent a flurry of attacks at him. Attacks that Luffy easily dodged with his literally lightning fast reflexes, matching every one of Lucci's punches with one of his own. Lucci, caught off guard (again) by Luffy's speed was quickly hit by a chain of moves and sent flying into the wall (_again_.)

Lucci stood shakily as Luffy went in for another round of punches, "Let me show you the most powerful move available for those with a mastery of the six forms." Lucci growled, materialising in front of Luffy and holding both of his fists to the pirate's stomach, catching the pirate with his tail when Luffy tried to escape. "ROKUGAN!" Lucci yelled, sending a wave of power through his opponent, who was knocked back and landed heavily on the floor with a dull thud.

Lucci smirked; there was no way that the pirate was going to get up after that. Imagine his surprise when Luffy started to laugh, hysterically, rolling around on the floor with tears running down his cheeks….much to the leopard Zoan's ire. Lucci scowled and waited for the kid to stop laughing, he knew that he should've attacked the pirate when he had the chance but he was curious as to why Luffy was laughing; his Rokugan was nothing to laugh at!

"That's your strongest move?!" Luffy gasped out through his giggles, "In that case d'you wanna see one of mine?" He asked seriously, muffling the last of his giggles and puling himself up into a standing position.

Lucci stared warily at the pirate, it wasn't the kid's words that made him worry, it was Luffy's tone of voice – it just seemed to confident – it was as if the pirate knew that his move would utterly crush Lucci's and that was what made the leopard Zoan worry.

"Well, you don't have a choice anyway, I'm –!" Luffy started to say but was cut off when the walls started to shake and a huge hole opened up next to them, almost reaching to the ceiling and easily 10 metres wide. Staring through the hole, the first thing that Luffy noticed was that the bridge connecting the tower that they were on to the main bridge-thingy was gone. The second thing that he noticed was that Sanji, Zoro, Usopp (in his Sogeking mask) and Franky were standing on the edge of the wrecked bridge and were all looking at him and Lucci.

"LUFFY-KUN!" Usopp shouted, drawing his and Lucci's attention, "OVER HERE!"

"EVERYONE GOT TO THE BRIDGE SAFELY!" Franky yelled, "WE'RE ALL FINE!"

"THERE'S NO NEED TO WORRY ABOUT US, LUFFY-KUN!"

"WE SAVED ROBIN-CHAN TOO!" Sanji yelled, punching the air.

"NOW YOU JUST HAVE TO BEAT HIM!" Franky added.

"BEAT HIM, LUFFY!" Zoro yelled.

"AND, TOGETHER…" Usopp continued.

"WE CAN GO BACK!" Sanji finished.

Luffy smiled, an easy grin setting onto his face, and nodded before turning back to Lucci.

"Well, pigeon guy, they all survived. I knew they would." Luffy grinned happily.

"I'm impressed, let's see how long you can keep this up. Evil will not prosper in this world and neither will you." Lucci replied, a cocky grin etched on his face, only to be quickly wiped away when Luffy started laughing again – much to the surprise of the four watching him from the bridge.

"Not all pirates are evil and not all marines are as righteous as you may believe." Luffy lectured, before a malicious grin replaced the easy one that he had been wearing previously. "Now I'm going to show you a move that can crush you Rokugan." Luffy stated, letting the lightning that had been increasing his speed earlier fade away, erasing the blue tinge that his skin had been coated with earlier.

"But I warn you, Rob Lucci," Luffy started, surprising his opponent by using his full name, "You'd better dodge most of this….or in the best case you'll never be able to move again and in the worst you'll die."

Luffy surprised not only Lucci but Sanji, Zoro, Usopp and Franky with that piece of information (how they managed to hear that from so far away though is anyone's guess); they'd all thought that Luffy wouldn't use such a crippling move in a fight, evidently not if he was going to use a one-hit-kill move now. While these thoughts zapped through the minds of his opponent and observers, Luffy prepared for the lethal move by dropping down slightly until he was hunched over and starting to shift into his quarter form.

Lucci, Sanji, Zoro, Usopp and Franky stared in astonishment as wings sprouted from Luffy's shoulder blades and the skin on his arms transformed into black fur, his fingers turned into claws and his nails grew and sharpened until they looked like they could cut steel. At the same time the skin on Luffy's back legs shifted into dark green and black scales, whilst his feet became furry and dog like accompanied by three huge claws and a large fluffy and furry tail with a steel like tip, that dug into the concrete along with his back claws to hold his body in place.

Luffy grinned at the you-have-got-to-be-shitting-me stares; Lucci had never seen this form so his surprise was to be expected, but he had shown his crew all of his forms so he had no idea why they were staring as well. If they were surprised now then how would they react once they'd seen the actual move?

"Quarter form….." Luffy started, arching his wings above his head and beginning to gather lightning at an exponential rate in the space between the two wing tips.

At the same time Lucci's mind was racing, he was trying to figure out what Luffy was trying to do. Then he noticed the small crackles of energy forming in between the pirate's arched wings, _lightning again _he realised with a jolt, but he didn't know what Luffy was going to do with it. Then he had a sudden, terrifying thought, _what if he can manipulate it into a bullet of sorts? _This thought completely changed his opinion of the pirate, the kid was strong, perhaps even stronger than him, but by the time he had realised what his opponent was doing it was too late.

While Lucci had been thinking, the small crackles of lightning had developed into a ball, which soon grew to the size of Luffy's head, then doubled in size and kept on growing until finally it was taller that Lucci himself, then it compressed, getting smaller and smaller as it grew more and more powerful. When Luffy reckoned that the ball of lightning was small enough, he stopped feeding it and instead turned his attention back towards his opponent, "Remember Lucci," he cried, throwing his furry and clawed hands into the air and grasping the edges of the lightning ball, "YOU'D BETTER SURVIVE THIS!" He yelled, cocking his arms back, **"THUNDER CANNON!"** He roared, throwing the ball of lightning straight at Lucci at astronomical speeds.

His nakama who were observing stared in shock as the ball of electricity thundered towards Lucci and the CP9's strongest member was hit by lightning before the whole thing exploded. They shielded their eyes as the tower was obscured from view by a blinding white light accompanied by a loud crackling boom that shook the air, and when they opened their eyes again Lucci was lying face down on the ground and Luffy was standing in his full human form a few metres away.

He wasn't standing for long though, quickly dropping onto his hands and knees, then falling forwards onto his front and sucking in the air in loud, gasping pants. Luffy knew that Thunder Cannon wasn't meant to be used when in quarter form; it had a huge backlash and was supposed to be used when he was in full form or at least half form if he was pushing it. All of his muscles hurt, breathing hurt and he had numerous burns, internal and external from the lightning. He could tell that Lucci had survived though; he could hear the damn Zoan breathing, so Lucci was alive…whether he would ever be able to move again though was another story.

"That should be enough." Luffy gasped.

"It isn't."

Luffy stared in horror as Lucci stood up, coughing out a mouthful of blood and grinning evilly. "I've already told you; you can't beat me." He said, smirking and taking a step forward, towards where Luffy was struggling to stand.

"LUFFY!"

Luffy's head snapped over to the bridge, where Usopp was standing without his Sogeking mask.

"Usopp…" He coughed out.

"LUFFY! GET UP!" Usopp shouted, "DON'T GET ME WRONG! I JUST CAME TO SAVE ROBIN! I DIDN'T COME TO SEE YOU OR ANYTHING!"

"Geez…" Zoro snarled, "That idiot…"

"OI, YOU! CP9'S BOSS-NEKO! I'LL BE YOUR OPPONENT! COME AND GET ME! T-THAT'S RIGHT, I'M YOUR OPPONENT!"

Luffy grinned as Usopp carried on with his spiel of lies, like how he'd travelled the whole grand line and that he'd destroyed island after island.

"STOP IT USOPP! ARE YOU AN IDIOT?!" Luffy yelled as Lucci looked like he was actually going to kill the sniper.

"THEN WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU GONNA DO, WHEN YOUR SO CLOSE TO DEATH?!" Usopp shot back.

"I'M GONNA KICK HIS ASS!" Luffy replied.

"THEN STAND UP! STOP LOOKING LIKE YOU'RE ABOUT TO DIE! IT'S NOT LIKE YOU!" Usopp yelled, panting a bit from having to yell so loud, "EVEN THOUGH IT'S BEEN BLACKENED FROM THE EXPLOSIONS, WE CAN STILL SEE THE SKY! WE CAN STILL SEE THE SEA! THIS PLACE…THIS PLACE ISN'T HELL! STOP LOOKING IKE YOU'RE GOING TO DIE, BASTARD! STOP MAKING ME WORRY, DAMMIT!"

"Are you finished?" Lucci asked, stepping forward, "Then prepare yourself for-!"

Luffy materialised in front of him with a cry of "Gear Second; Jet Pistol!" He punched the boss-cat of CP9 in the face, knocking him back a few paces.

"Got it!" Luffy yelled, facing Lucci with his back to Usopp, "This isn't hell or anything!"

"Luffy…" Usopp gasped, "BEAT HIM! THEN WE'LL ALL GO BACK TOGETHER, LUFFY!"

"NO MATTER WHAT!" Luffy screamed, shooting forwards towards Lucci.

Lucci matched his first punch with one of his own, and Luffy then blocked Lucci's counter with one of his own. Their fists blurred as they matched punch for punch and kick for kick, neither of them giving an inch, blood splattering on the floor as they continued to pummel each other. Then, at some sort of signal that only they could hear, they separated, retreating away from each other until there was a 3 or 4 metre gap between them.

"Seimei Kikan Kaijo." Lucci said, his form growing in size until it was as big as it was when he first transformed, "I'm tired of your interference. I'll defeat you in one powerful blow."

"You wanna bet?! Not if I get you first!" Luffy roared, the skin on his hands and arms transforming into fur and his nails turning into claws and lightning wrapping around his left arm. Lucci's eyes widened, again, as the lightning moulded into a cone-like shape around Luffy's arm, wrapping round his hands and forming a point several inches away from his fist.

Luffy shot forward, ignoring the lightning burning the skin on his shoulders and back, holding his right arm out as a guide and materialising in front of Lucci again, cocking his fist back and screaming **"THUNDER LANCE!" **Burying the lightning cone into Lucci's chest and sending a charge ripping straight through the leopard Zoan's body.

Luffy then let the lightning fade away and turned his back to the still standing Zoan, walking away as Lucci collapsed to the ground, smoke hissing out of his mouth. Grabbing his hat from around his neck and placing it on his head as he walked away, shadowing his eyes and making him look even more dangerous than he already looked.

"REPORTING TO ALL SHIPS! ROB LUCCI OF CP9, JUST NOW, WAS DEFEATED BY THE PIRATE 'MUGIWARA NO LUFFY'!"

Luffy walked to the edge of the tower and drew in a huge breath, "LET'S GO BACK TOGETHER!" He yelled, his voice carrying across the water, "RRROOOBBBIIINNN!" He finished, with a huge grin stretching across his face.

**XXXXX**

_**Number two….Never mess with his family…**_

Luffy growled, the idiots had taken his brother, his Ace. Hadn't they learned from last time?! When they had tried to take Robin away from him?! No, he decided, he had been too easy on them back at Enies Lobby, he had only gone up to his quarter form, that hadn't been far enough. And back at Impel Down; he should've just gone full form as soon as he got there, he had been stupid. But the marines had gone too far this time; they were trying to kill _his_ brother…_his_ Ace!

They will learn not to mess with me or mine, he thought laughing somewhat sadistically, missing the lightning that was now crackling around his body and the way that everyone within 10 feet of him was backing away with terrified expressions on their faces.

Near the front of the stolen warship, Iva, Crocodile and Jimbe all suppressed a shudder and inwardly swore not to get in Luffy's way when he was fighting. They took another peek at Mugiwara, who was sitting off to the side and giggling insanely while crackles of lightning sparked across his skin, a murderous look in his eyes. No, they thought, nowhere _near_ Luffy while he's fighting.

XXX

Meanwhile, at Marineford, up on the execution tower, Ace and Garp were praying, no, _pleading_ to anyone up there that Luffy stayed away from the battle. That Luffy stayed well away from Marineford altogether and that, under no circumstances, should Luffy appear within 10 miles of Marineford at all. It was too dangerous, _far _too dangerous, to have Luffy in this blood bath, it wouldn't be good, not good _at all_. Naturally, their prayers went unanswered, because not 20 minutes later a warship fell out of the sky.

XXX

Luffy was falling, but that wasn't really a problem for him, he simply pulled out his wings and easily halted his fall – getting drenched in water from the melting ice for his troubles – , floating down to join the rest of his rescue Ace crew. He was still grinning dementedly and he still had the murderous glint in his eyes, but it was less pronounced, and slightly less scary, but his allies made a mental note to stay away from him anyway. Luffy gazed across the battleground, ready to get down there and pummel the bastards that were trying to kill his Ace, but a sandy dot caught his eye. He turned to see Crocodile zooming towards Whitebeard, his hook outstretched and a gleeful glint in his eyes. In seconds Luffy's powerful wings had him airborne and across the gap between the wrecked warship and the Moby Dick. He intercepted Crocodile with a water logged kick, sending him crashing into the deck.

Crocodile went to stand but a foot placed solidly on his cheek, pressing him into the deck, halted his attempts. He looked up and saw Luffy standing over him – wings surprisingly absent – , Luffy's sandaled foot pressing into his cheek, accompanied with a murderous aura and dangerously clenching fists, covered with a light coating of lightning.

"Now Croc-y," Luffy started in a deceptively sweet tone, "What have we learnt not to do?"

"….."

"Silence isn't an answer." Luffy sing-songed before pressing his foot further into the ex-Shichibukai's face, "Now what have we learnt not to do?"

"….."

"Really now," Luffy sighed, "I'll give you a clue." He said as a spear of lightning formed around his fist and his eyes got a demonic edge to them, "It starts with not-to-piss-off-pirates-that-can-fry-me-to-a-crisp and it ends with I-am-sorry-and-I-will-not-do-it-again-so-don't-hand-me-over-to-the-leader-that-I-just-tried-to-kill-so-that-he-can-return-the-favour-and-suceed. Now," Luffy growled, eyes becoming more and more snake like, **"What have we learnt?"**

Crocodile started to sweat and shakily repeated the statements that Luffy had just told him, adding in a few pleases and a thank you when Luffy smiled and let him back up. The Whitebeard commanders that were watching this exchange, and of course Whitebeard himself, all sweat dropped at Luffy's particular ahem 'methods' of extracting an answer from the ex-Shichibukai.

Luffy then turned to Whitebeard and told him, in a no nonsense tone, exactly what he had overheard about the marines' plans for the battle, detailing all of the codes that he had heard, and then repeating them word for word when he thought that the Yonkou may be able to translate them. Said Yonkou stood there in silence while Marco, standing off to the side, noted down the codes word for word and jotted down a few notes on the key information in Luffy's words.

Once Luffy was finished, he smiled at the Yonkou and asked "Once I've rescued Ace can we re-group back here?"

Whitebeard blinked before throwing back his head and laughing out loud, unnoticed by him – and most of the crew and commanders – Luffy's eyes narrowed and the warmth in them froze and turned cold and metallic. "You think that you're on the same level as those fighting right now, brat?!" Whitebeard asked, chuckling only to freeze when Luffy pierced him with his icy gaze and said, in the same no nonsense tone that he'd been using before,

"I'll show you," before he turned on his heel and walked to the edge of the railing, stopping just before it and turning his head slightly so that the commanders and Whitebeard could see one demonic, red eye, with a slit pupil, "Oh and Ossan…. I will be the one to become Pirate King!" He yelled before vaulting over the railing and off the ship, missing the shocked looks of the commanders, the crew and Whitebeard himself.

Luffy landed gently on the ice next to the Moby Dick, pulling out his wings to slow his fall – he wouldn't dare try to fly to Ace, he was practically asking to be killed seeing as Kizaru could easily pick him off with a well aimed kick of light –, and ran forward, towards the wave of marines running to engage him – and possibly gain a promotion for defeating a pirate with a bounty of 300 million. He went through the first wave like a knife through butter; easily knocking them out with well placed punches and kicks, a few marines trying to hit him from behind found that his wings were _very_ flexible and as hard to cut as steel.

The second and third waves of marines went down in roughly the same way, with very little effort on Luffy's part, but when it came to the rest of the marines, who had given up on the wave formation by then and were just going in as an all out melee, he decided to step it up a little and pulled out the fur, paws and claws on his hands and arms from the shoulder down. From that point it was slice and dice as he swept through the marines, cutting down those in his path with his lightning enhanced claws.

About 5 minutes into the battle, after coming close to decimating the marines' ranks, Luffy came across his first strong enemy in the form of Kizaru's kick of light. Luffy didn't even attempt to dodge it as he sensed that Iva already had that covered and sent him flying out of the way with a well timed Death Wink, Luffy just rolled with the impact, nodding to Iva in thanks, pulling himself up seconds later and continuing to sprint towards Ace… Only to be hit the ground again minutes later when Kuma shot a beam of light at both him and Iva, forcing Luffy to grab Iva and take to the skies to dodge the potentially lethal beam before both of them had to swerve away and drop out of the air, falling to the ground with a hard thump, when Kizaru aimed another kick of light at them.

In some sort of weird luck Luffy landed right next to Hancock and Smoker, while Iva landed next to Kuma, just as Sengoku made another speech,

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?! DON'T LET A ROOKIE CONTROL THIS WAR! HE'S ALSO A LOOSE CANNON! HE GREW UP TOGETHER WITH ACE AS HIS STEP BROTHER AND HE'S A BIOLOGICAL SON OF THE REVOLUTIONARY – DRAGON!"

Both Hancock and Smoker froze, staring at the pirate in front of them, Hancock didn't really care, she still loved Luffy either way while Smoker had a moment of understanding and finally found out why Dragon saved Luffy back in Loguetown. Luffy meanwhile, decided to just go all out and destroy the place, but before he could try he was knocked to the ground by Smoker and his annoying sea stone jutte, and then pinned by said annoying marine captain and jutte.

"You've become stronger." The captain mused as he pinned down the pirate.

"You have no idea….and you've got stronger too." Luffy replied, completely unfazed about his lineage just being revealed to the whole world and currently being pinned down by a marine captain.

He wasn't pinned down for long though, as seconds later Hancock kicked Smoker out of the way, forcing him off of Luffy and sending him sprawling onto the concrete. Smoker picked himself up, levelling a stare at the female Shichibukai,

"Why aren't you doing your duty as a marine?!" He demanded, furious that Hancock had ruined his chance at capturing the pirate that he'd been chasing for a while now.

"I've never been so angry in all my life!" Hancock retorted, "How dare you try to hurt my beloved Luffy!"

Smoker blinked, since when had they known each other? Hell, since when had Boa Hancock (of all people) started liking men?!

"Thanks Hancock." Luffy said gratefully, standing up and brushing himself off.

Hancock flushed and bent down to Luffy's level, looking him straight in the eye,

"It's nothing. Anyway, Luffy, here is the key to your brother's cuffs." She whispered, holding a small key in her hands and holding it out to him.

"Thanks Hancock," Luffy grinned, "But can you hold on to it for a while?" He asked, pouting slightly (which she found adorable.)

"Why?" She asked, a puzzled expression written across her features.

"Well, you know that I'm a Zoan right?" Luffy started, whispering so that the marines couldn't listen in to the conversation.

"Yes, you showed us your half form back on Amazon Lilly." Hancock replied, also whispering.

"Well in my full form I can't hold keys, so I'll just carry you and the key to Ace." Luffy explained.

"Oh, so you're going to take your full form, and you'll carry me to the execution tower?" She asked, blushing furiously.

"Yup. Oh, could you hold on to my clothes for me?" He replied, already stripping down to his boxers (thank god that he chose to not go commando today, or that would be awkward.)

Hancock turned bright red and shakily took the offered clothes from him, stuttering half formed words all the while.

"My full form is too big and tends to tear up my clothes, and Ace would kill me if I rescued him while naked! As soon as I've transformed, jump on my back, okay?" Luffy chirped, happily ignoring the jaw-dropping stares that he got for reducing the male-hating female Shichibukai to stuttered words and a cherry red blush.

"O-okay." Hancock stuttered, still very red.

"Yosh!" Luffy yelled, completely ignoring the stares that he was getting for being naked except for his boxers, "Let's go!"

Many eyes widened as Luffy's form bulged, sprouting fur and feathery wings, and growing in size until he easily towered over Hancock. Said Shichibukai simply gaped in awe as she stared up at the huge wolf towering over her, he was at least 2 feet taller than her to the shoulder and his head stood another foot or so above that. His wings were tucked neatly into his sides and he looked down at her with blood red eyes with a slit pupil, his paws scrapped across the ground, the huge claws gouging thick lines out of the concrete and his tail flickered agitatedly as he waited for her to hurry up and get on already.

Blushing, Hancock scrambled up, using his fur to pull herself up until she was comfortably seated behind his wings, wrapping her fingers into his fur to use as a handhold. Once she thought that she was steady she hesitantly squeezed his sides to tell him that she was ready to go, then suppressed a yelp as Luffy shot forwards, charging through the marines and dodging round the pirates with incredible speed and agility.

They were doing well and were around 150 metres away from the execution tower when _it_ happened; two executioners walked up to the tower, long swords held in their hands and walked to stand either side of Ace, placing the swords against his neck before lifting them up, ready to cut his head off with one blow. Luffy froze, skidding to a stop, claws raking into the ground, as he stared wide eyed at the execution tower, on his back Hancock stiffened – if Ace died here her beloved would be devastated – as she silently prepared to use her King's Haki.

She was beaten to the punch as a loud Haki infused roar ripped through Marineford, courtesy of Luffy, knocking out many of the weaker marines and pirates, including the two executioners up on the tower. Every eye turned back to Luffy who, still in his winged wolf form, was already sprinting again, pushing himself faster and faster in his haste to reach the execution tower.

100 metres to go and they were forced to stop again, this time because they were blocked by the three admirals, standing in a line in front of the snarling wolf.

Luffy skidded to a stop, snarling furiously at the humans who dared to stand in his way when he was trying to rescue a member of his pack. He shook his sides roughly, signalling for the female on his back to climb off, which she did with a sense of haste, and unfurled his wings, shaking out the huge feathery appendages before arching them over his head. The wings flared, crackling with electricity as it gathered in between the tips, the human in the stripy yellow suit arched an eyebrow but Luffy wasn't done. The human head sized lightning ball formed and his wings stopped crackling, instead they started burning with large orange flames that didn't seem to burn the feathers in the slightest, the flames gathered between the tips and a ball of flame formed next to the lightning ball. Then the flames roared as wind was pulled and gathered around the wolf, forming a ball of wind next to the lightning and fire ones. The flames then died and the air grew moist as the fourth ball was added, this time it was made out of water, next the ground seemed to shake and cracked below his feet and a sphere of earth was formed and joined the four floating in the air above him. Finally the shadows on the battlefield seemed to twist and turn and the sixth and final ball was added, a sphere of pure darkness, the ball of shadow.

Luffy seemed to smirk, which was quite daunting seeing as he was showing the admirals his huge several inch long razor sharp teeth, and clapped his wings together, forcing the elemental spheres to collide, blinding the admirals with white light as the six spheres melded together. Luffy then reared up, snatching the fusion product out of the air and, with a snap of his head, sending it flying towards the admirals. Without waiting to see what happened next, Luffy grabbed Hancock by the back of her dress, gently slinging her over his back with another flick of his head, and took off, huge and powerful wings carrying him away from the admirals and he was already tens of feet up when the fusion product reached the admirals.

The small ball of something floated innocently in front of the admirals for a few seconds, deceiving them with its lack of movement, drawing them in with curiosity, and then it exploded. Springing to life in a flurry of movement, long tendrils of wood snaked out, wrapping around the admirals, who were caught off guard by the speed at which the wooden vines moved. They wrapped around everything within a 10 metre range, dragging them in closer, and then it collapsed in on itself, dragging whatever it had caught with it, and seconds later it had collapsed into nothingness as if it had never existed.

Luffy dived down and landed behind the, still standing, admirals. Out of the three Kizaru had gotten away with the least injuries – thanks to his light powers he had flashed away just in time and had only lost his admiral coat –, Aokiji was next – thanks to his quick thinking, and the fact that he'd been the furthest way from Luffy when he'd thrown the ball of something, he'd only lost a finger (which was startling enough because usually Logia's can only be hurt by other Logias and Haki users) – and Akainu had come out the worst, due to the fact that he was closest to the attack's centre and was too arrogant to retreat, and he'd lost a whole hand.

Meanwhile, Iva had caught up with Luffy and Hancock behind the admirals and had had Inazuma (who had been hiding in the okama's huge afro hair) cut a path up to the execution tower, which Luffy quickly took advantage of, leaping up the concrete ramp and sprinting towards the top where he could see Ace, with Hancock desperately trying to get a good grip on his fur and avoid falling off. They were _so_ close when Garp intercepted them, within 2 metres of the execution tower, and broke the concrete ramp with a smile aimed at his wolfen grandson.

Breaking the ramp had served no purpose though, because as soon as it started to crumble Luffy leapt into the air, using his huge wings to extend his jump, gliding effortlessly onto the execution tower just as the last of the concrete ramp fell, taking Garp with it. The huge wolf stared down at the fleet admiral, barely looking at Ace while Hancock worked on freeing him from his cuffs, focused on protecting the two humans behind him from the dangerous smelling human in front of him, although the sea gull wearing man didn't look strong, he was dangerous and Luffy could tell.

So when the fleet admiral suddenly swelled and grew, turning gold and threw a massive punch at them, Luffy wasn't surprised. He took control of the situation, his tail darting out to wrap around the massive wrist, swinging his whole body round and forcing the punch to the side, landing barely a foot away from him and destroying the execution tower in the process. Ace and Hancock fell first, just as a barely audible click caught Luffy's attention, he gave a happy bark, his tail wrapping round his brother and wannabe lover and depositing them both on his back. He then unfurled his wings and leapt backwards, just as the crumbling execution tower was hit by several cannon balls, creating a large fiery explosion.

All three of them landed safely, Ace and Hancock instantly leaping off of Luffy's back to cover the mythical Zoan while he caught his breath, Luffy was panting hard now but his tail was wagging energetically, obviously happy to have his brother back at his side. After a few seconds of Ace and Hancock kicking marine butt, Luffy scooped them up again, dropping them back onto his back and setting off again, this time making a beeline for Whitebeard who was standing on the other side of a huge chasm created by his earthquake making abilities.

Luffy padded to a stop in front of the huge Yonkou, looking the feared pirate straight in the eye,

"I'm still bigger than you brat." The Yonkou said, chuckling while staring at the huge winged wolf that was currently carrying one of his sons.

Luffy simply tilted his head and butted Whitebeard's chest playfully, the Yonkou recoiled when he felt a stabling pain in his chest from the stab wound that he'd received earlier and then it disappeared. He glanced down at the wound… only there wasn't a wound anymore, in fact there weren't any wounds at all and he'd never felt more alive and he stared at the wolf in wonder before chuckling,

"I'm _still_ bigger than you." He repeated.

Luffy seemed to make a few weird grumbling and growing sounds, intersected by low rumbling sounds and it became apparent to all those watching that the huge wolf was laughing. Then Luffy's form seemed to bulge again before growing, rising up until he was almost twice as tall as the Yonkou. Luffy stared down at the huge pirate and arched an eyebrow (how he managed that while in his wolf form will forever remain a grand line mystery) his look clearly saying 'who's the tall one now.'

"Cocky brat." Whitebeard grumbled, before going wide eyed when huge teeth clamped around his sash and pants and lifted him high into the air. He turned wildly only to see Ace and Hancock looking at him wide eyed and muffling their laughter as he was dumped next to them on the winged wolf's huge back.

"Yo Pops." Ace grinned cheerfully, before springing over to him and settling on the Yonkou's lap, happily humming all the while, "When Luffy's in this form he gets what he wants and at the moment he doesn't want you to die." Ace pointed out, obviously explaining why his Pops had been healed and put up here with him and Hancock.

"Cocky brat." Whitebeard grumbled fondly.

"Yes he is." Ace agreed.

Back on the ground, the Whitebeard commanders breathed sighs of relief, their father wasn't going to die here, and Luffy had made sure of that. Said pirate turned wolf simply stretched and neatly jumped over the chasm that the Yonkou had created, carefully landing so that he didn't crush any of his pirate allies (or marines that he liked) underfoot, the rest of the marines however scrambled to get away from the wolf as he casually walked over to the Moby Dick, turning his back to the crumbled remains of the execution tower. This was a mistake… but not for him or his allies, as it made a certain admiral leap at the huge wolf, wanting to avenge the hand that he'd lost by at least landing a hit on the wolf or any of the three passengers sitting on his back.

A wolf's sense of smell is hundreds of times greater than a human's and it's hearing is as good as a bat's, so while Ace couldn't detect Akainu coming up behind them (although Whitebeard and Hancock could faintly sense him), Luffy could hear every movement he made and the admiral's unique scent of burning rock instantly told Luffy who was trying to take out one of his pack. So when Akainu was within 10 feet of him, Luffy's tail darted out, catching the admiral around the stomach and sending him flying into the air, he was them used as a play toy as Luffy's tail batted him to and fro before finally sending him flying back towards the execution tower where he landed with a large boom.

The marines and pirates alike winced as Akainu fell to the ground, beaten and bloody, and turned back to Luffy who had one demonic eye locked on them, the message was clear though; don't mess with my pack.

The marines looked around at the destruction as the pirates retreated and escaped, Luffy lead the way, carrying away the cause of the war along with Whitebeard and the only female Shichibukai.

Don't mess with my pack indeed.

**XXXXX**

_**Number three…Don't ever, even as a last resort, even in the most desperate of situations….don't ever mess with his hat…..**_

The Straw hat pirates and Ace (who had come over to visit his little brother, since they hadn't seen each other for a while) watched in horror as Luffy's hat was sliced in two, and the two halves fell to the ground with barely a sound. A moment of silence passed while Luffy tried to comprehend what had just happened.

"What are you gonna do now, Mugiwara?!" The other pirate taunted, waving his sword in the air and laughing sadistically, while his crew around him laughed.

The members of Luffy's crew all took a step back, leaving the idiotic pirates to their fate; they had messed with Luffy's precious hat and now they were going to pay the price.

"**I'm going to kill you." **Luffy growled, instantly transforming into his full form and sending a barrage of lighting attacks at the pirates.

"Oi oi oi, shouldn't we stop him?" Usopp asked, as Luffy proceeded to pummel the unknown pirates into the ground.

"Do you want to try and stop him while he's in that form?" Zoro asked, already lying on a nearby wall, watching while Luffy took his anger out on the other crew for damaging his precious hat.

"Nope." Usopp replied with the rest of the crew, also sitting down to wait for Luffy to finish.

Half an hour later and the crew was half way through their thirteenth round of Blackjack when the crashes, explosions and screams of pain ended and Luffy trudged over to them, holding his broken hat in his hands and whimpering.

"It's okay Lu." Ace whispered, drawing the sniffling pirate into his arms, "We'll fix your hat."

"Really?" Luffy whispered, hope filling his voice.

"Really." Ace replied, smiling softly.

"Ace, you're the best." Luffy laughed, hugging his brother with all his strength.

While the two brothers were having their touching moment, Zoro and Sanji were assessing the damage that Luffy had caused over the last half hour.

"Oi?"

"What marimo?" Sanji asked, looking at all the craters and torn up buildings that Luffy had left in his wake.

"Do you think they'll ever learn?" Zoro asked, staring at the half dead crew that were scattered around the craters and in the rubble.

"What?" Sanji asked, nudging the closest beaten up pirate to see if he was still breathing.

"Not to mess with Luffy's hat." Zoro replied.

Sanji took a long drag from his smoke, letting it billow into the air before turning to his fellow crew member and smiling,

"Nope."

**End**

**Explanations: **

**I did my research and it turns out that winged wolves **_**do**_** have elemental abilities, shape shifting abilities and healing powers but since Luffy is a young wolf, although he can control the elements to same extent, he only ad complete control over lightning. **

**If you have any queries feel free to ask.**

**Review please. **


	13. Hurts

**To youshouldn'tneedtoknow,**

**A winged wolf is a mythological wolf with wings. The Winged Wolf (Flying Wolf, Pterolykos, Pterolycus) is a creature with origins in German, Russian and Hungarian folklore. It has many abilities such as control over the elements, healing powers and shape shifting, in some stories it is considered holy but in others it is a demonic entity, a winged wolf with bird-like wings (feathers) is usually considered holy whilst a winged wolf with bat-like wings (bones and membrane) is usually considered demonic but this isn't always the case. The winged wolf is often used in stories as a helper character, that would go along with the hero or villain and help them progress through the story. **

**That is as far as my knowledge on the Winged Wolf goes, but I hope that it helps, **

**Now on with the ficlet!...which shouldn't be this late! But school is (again) bogging me down…but ignore my mini-rant and read on dear viewers!**

**Hurts**

Luffy whimpered, clutching at his head and stumbling out of the boy's room, one hand against the wall to keep him from falling over and succumbing to the pain in his head. He gently edged through the halls of the Merry, finally emerging in the kitchen after what seemed like hours but in reality was only a few minutes. When he finally reached the kitchen he fell, with no wall to support him, crashing into the wooden deck with a whimper and disturbing Sanji, who was trying to make a new dessert for Nami and Robin to try later.

"WHAT D'YOU WANT LUFFY?! I'VE ALREADY TOLD YOU THAT I'M NOT GOING TO MAKE YOU ANYTHING!" Sanji yelled, distracted from his ice-cream making by his – suspiciously quiet – captain.

Luffy simply whimpered again, curling into a foetal position, clutching his head and stomach hard enough to make his knuckles go white.

Sanji stared, not at all prepared for this reaction, and gently called out to his child captain, this time his voice was a lot softer and without any real annoyance or anger that his previous yell had carried,

"Luffy? What's wrong?" He asked, pausing in his snack making to walk over to the small brunette.

"Head hurts," Luffy whispered, looking up at the blond hovering over him with teary eyes, "Makes me wanna throw up."

"Your head hurts?" Sanji asked quietly, concern flooding his words.

Luffy whispered a pained 'yes', not wanting to nod unless he was certain that it wouldn't make his head hurt even more than it already did.

"Enough to make you want to throw up?" Sanji pressed, trying to figure out what was wrong with his friend and captain.

Luffy hissed out another yes as another wave of pain seared through his head, making him tremble even as tears slipped down his face.

"Did you hit your head or something?" Sanji asked, gently rubbing circles on the small brunette's back reassuringly.

"N-no…it j-just started hurtin'…" Luffy replied through his tears.

"Have you eaten anything strange lately?" Sanji asked gently, not wanting to push Luffy when he was so fragile and distressed.

"N-no." Luffy whimpered.

"Okay Luffy," Sanji soothed, wiping away the tears running down his captain's cheeks, "I'm going to take you to Chopper, he'll know what to do." Sanji continued, gently curling his arms around the small teen and effortlessly lifting him into the air.

Luffy simply curled into him, seeking comfort in the cook's warm hold. He made a small sound of pain when Sanji started walking, but apart from that he was very quiet throughout the short trip, slipping in and out of consciousness as his head throbbed, sometimes the pain was agonizing and other times it was just a dull throb hovering over his left eye, the pain dulled his awareness and he barely noticed when Sanji finally slipped into the infirmary and quietly cursed when he found it empty.

Sanji sighed and tried to lay Luffy down on the bed in the infirmary so that he could go find Chopper…key word, _tried_. As soon as the cook made an attempt to lower the brunette onto the bed Luffy immediately tightened his arms around the cook, wrapping the elder teen in rubbery arms and whispering the word 'no' repeatedly. Sanji sighed,

"Luffy," he sighed again, "Let go of me so that I can put you on the bed and go find Chopper."

"No." Luffy stated, fists clutching into the cook's shirt.

"_Luffy_."

"_No_."

Sanji blinked, Luffy was in one of _those_ moods, the one where he would not let anyone tell him what to do and what not to do. It was frustrating when he acted like this, Sanji thought, because it meant that his level of determination to get what he wanted increased to astronomical figures…it was also one of the only times that he would invoke 'Captain's Orders.'

He let out another sigh, belatedly remembering that he had left his cigarettes in the kitchen, and tightened his grip on his captain, carrying Luffy out of the infirmary to go search for Chopper.

Fifteen minutes later and he was mentally cursing up a storm; Luffy was getting worse, they'd had to stop twice so that Luffy could throw up while Sanji held back his hair and they'd yet to find a single other person in the halls or in some of the rooms that they'd checked – well Sanji had checked, cause Luffy was in no condition to be walking around let alone checking rooms.

Finally Sanji gave up, realising that there was no one else on the ship and that Chopper had probably gone ashore with the rest of the crew when they'd docked earlier, and took Luffy back to the boys' cabin after snagging a book from the library and a thick blanket from one of the cupboards on the way. He made a beeline for the couch as soon as he entered the room, slowly lowering himself and Luffy onto the soft cushions and lying flat across the couch, head and shoulders supported by the pillows while Luffy was curled on top of him. Sanji pulled the pilfered blanket over his small captain, running long fingers through the brunette's hair and rubbing small circles on his back until Luffy's breathing evened out and he fell into a restless sleep.

Sanji then took the opportunity to pick up his stolen book from where he'd dropped it on the floor, he flicked it open and started to read, letting himself be drawn into the book. He had to stop every few chapters though, because Luffy was very restless in his sleep and clearly suffering from horrible nightmares as he thrashed about every now and then, so Sanji was forced to stop reading and gently sooth the small teen before he hurt himself or the cook that was currently his mattress.

Sanji sighed for what felt like the billionth time that afternoon, "The things we do for you Luffy," he muttered as said rubber teen turned in his sleep and buried his head into the cook's shoulder.

"But," he continued, sighing again, "You've done a lot more for us, so I guess this is what we do to repay you…"

Luffy smiled in his sleep, he looked so innocent, Sanji thought, but underneath that façade was a genius fighter who could take down people far older and stronger that he was. Sanji smiled again, but right now he was just an innocent, helpless, cute – Sanji blinked, cute? Since when had he thought that Luffy – of all people – was cute?! Sanji shook his head furiously, clearing all 'cute' thoughts from his head except those pertaining to Robin-chwan or Nami-swan, if he stayed here too long, with Luffy being all innocent and sleeping on him, then he might actually go into the realm of the impossible, where Usopp wasn't an idiot and Zoro wasn't a marimo or where Brook wasn't perverted and where Franky actually wore pants that weren't Speedos!

And he really didn't want to go there…Sanji scowled, where was Chopper anyway, shouldn't he be back by now, it had been three hours since the rest of the crew had left, they said that they'd only be two hours tops. He sighed again, picking up his pilfered book once more and starting to read, there was nothing to do but wait…and hope that Chopper came back before he stopped thinking of Zoro as a marimo.

000

Outside the door to the boys' cabin, Nami giggled, clutching the camera to her chest while belli signs flashed in her eyes.

These pictures would sell for thousands, getting one cute picture of Luffy and Sanji together was insanely difficult, and she'd just got dozens over the course of the last hour, snapping away dementedly every time Luffy moved an inch.

She decided to leave those two on ship duty more often, just think of all the money that she could make off of them, those two were pure gold.


	14. Care

**A/N: Sorry for not updating for a while, I was on holiday and forgot my laptop, then spent forever trying to type this up – my handwriting is atrocious! D:**

**Summary: Marineford ficlet – pretty sure that its crap – Sabo saves Ace and Luffy in Marineford and they escape in a small boat which later washes up on an uninhabited island. **

**Care**

"They had washed up on an island after the havoc of Marineford and had soon come to the realisation that this tiny island had no human inhabitants…"

"Sabo….?"

"….although the island was filled with a variety of animals…"

"…er….Sabo!?"

"….and a range of different plant life, some unique to the island…."

"SABO!"

Sigh "Yes Luffy?"

"What are you doing?"

"Making a log."

"….you don't have any paper though." Ace shot in.

"Well…."

"…or a pen, not even a leaf or twig." Luffy added.

"Shut up Luffy. What else are we supposed to do; it's so~ boring here."

"It's an uninhabited…" Ace started.

"…by humans…" Luffy added.

"….by humans…" Ace agreed, "…island. It's bound to be boring." He finished, throwing a handful of sand into the waves. It was true, the island was tiny, and he had walked round it in less than half a day. To make things worse he and Luffy still had quite a few untreated injuries, Luffy more so than himself, and the boat that they had escaped on was punched full of holes so they couldn't leave. Add that to the fact that almost no one knew that they were here – or even alive – and you had a pretty shitty situation.

"Then we need to do something to pass the time until help arrives….or a ship that we could steal comes along." Sabo commented.

"Well what do you suggest we do then?" Ace demanded.

"You could tell me what you did after I left or what adventures you had whilst sailing on the seas." Sabo suggested.

"Ok." Luffy chirped, "But you have to tell us how you survived and what you did up until you met us again, and Ace has to tell his adventures too!"

"Deal," Ace and Sabo said simultaneously.

"I'll start!" Luffy yelled.

"Ok," Ace said. "But first I want to know how you got into Impel Down and then Marineford. And I want the full story not just so and so got me there! Got it?" Sabo nodded his agreement – he wanted to know too!

"Yup." Luffy said, popping the 'p'.

"Oh and why your crew didn't come with you to Impel Down or Marineford. When I met your guys you all seemed as thick as thieves, what happened?" Ace asked.

"Well, after you met us Ace, we got 3 new members. Oh, and Sabo, my crew had 8 members, not including me! My first mate Zoro (he's a swordsman ad he uses 3 swords), my navigator Nami (she has a clima-tact that makes weather and she uses it to fight), my sharp-shooter Usopp (he fights with a slingshot and also goes by Soge-King), my cook Sanji (he fights with his feet), my doctor Chopper (he's a reindeer who ate the human-human fruit and he has 7 transformations), my archaeologist Robin (she ate a devil-fruit that allows her to grow extra limbs anywhere), my ship-Wright Franky (he's a cyborg) and my musician Brook (he's a living skeleton!)"

"….a living skeleton?" Ace asked hesitantly.

"Yeah!" Luffy grinned, completely missing the baffled looks that his brothers exchanged. "Anyway we were at Shabondy, looking for a coater so that we could go to Fishman Island, but our friend Camie (she's a mermaid) got kidnapped so we went to rescue her. She was taken to a 'human shop' to be sold….we tried to buy her back…it didn't work. This tennryuubito wanted her and then he shot Hachi (he's a merman) and I got mad…so…I punched him and sent him into a wall."

Ace and Sabo gaped at him; touching a tennryuubito was punishable by death! Luffy had punched one, an admiral would have been called in…..they were starting to see why their little brother's crew had been separated. But…how?

"Anyway," Luffy continued, "We got Camie – we had some help from this guy called Rayleigh, he had this cool power that knocked people out without him even touching them – and we fought off the marines surrounding the 'human shop.' Well me an' Kidd and Law did. They had big bounties like mine, and weird devil-fruit abilities; Law could make 'rooms' where he could chop people up and stick them back together and Kidd could control metal, he could 'repel' and 'attract' it _and_ he could make things with it…but they called _me_ the weird one?!"

Sabo and Ace smirked at this, because, yes, Luffy was (and still is) weird as hell! And a surprisingly good judge of character, he could tell friend from foe with a glance but he wouldn't fight with them unless they gave him a good reason.

"Well," Luffy continued, oblivious to their thoughts, "we escaped, but we were caught by this bear-bastard."

At this Luffy's tone darkened and Ace and Sabo listened intently to his anger coated words – he hated that he couldn't protect them, he hated that they were taken away from him, they were…no _are_ his nakama, his crew, and no-one should be able to tear them apart, he wouldn't let them…not again!

"The bear-bastard was too strong," Luffy ground out, "he sent them away from me using his devil-fruit powers. I watched, helpless, as they vanished in front of me. Robin was the last, I'll never forget her face, he eyes, telling me that she didn't want to go, her arm reached for me and, as I reached her – the second I reached her – she was gone. They were all gone…my nakama…I was alone…"

Luffy trembled, whether from anger or sorrow they would never know, but if they had to place a guess, they would say both.

"After that…well…it hurt, seeing them disappear…I'd lost them before, I thought that they were dead last time…but last time I saved them. But this time, they were gone…and I couldn't save them." He sighed, mentally shaking himself out of his depression before starting his tale again, "I was out of it at that point so…I didn't see it coming…well he hit me with the same attack that made my nakama disappear and I was sent flying, literally. I was in a bubble or something and I was flying across the sea. I don't know how long I was in there. I slept through most of it, but after a while I started to drop, I crash landed on an island…called Amazon Lily."

"Wait isn't that…" Ace began.

"The all women/maiden island?" Sabo finished.

"Yup."

"You are either really unlucky or someone up there hates you." Sabo commented.

"I defeated the guy up there." Luffy stated.

"What?!" Ace yelled incredulously.

"I defeated this 'god' called Enel."

"Really?" Sabo asked doubtfully.

"Yeah."

"We're getting off track here. Just carry on Lu." Ace interrupted before an argument could start up.

"'Kay. So I landed on Amazon Lily and I had a look around, to see where I was, I was surrounded by trees and jungle, so I used a vivre card to get back to Shabondy. The vivre was Shaky's – she owns a bar that was in the section where we left Sunny – I was making good progress, until I came to a mountain. I was too weak from the fight to smash through it, so I ate a mushroom that made me laugh, it was pretty fun so I ate some more. At some point though, I passed out."

"What? You passed out?" Sabo asked.

"Yeah," Luffy shrugged, "Then I woke up in a holding cell, the women of the island had saved me when I ate a weird mushroom that they said would have killed me. They only saved me 'cause they thought I was a girl though."

Luffy pouted while Ace and Sabo snickered; Luffy did look quite slim and delicate for a man.

"Shut up!" Luffy huffed, "Well, I stretched my arm to get my hat back and they saw my balls – they'd stripped me to get off the mushrooms that were growing all over my body after I ate the weird shroom – so they asked me what they were. I said 'kintama' and they asked if I could take them off."

Ace and Sabo blanched 'take them off?!' They winced, 'absolutely not!'

"Yeah I know," Luffy said, noticing their wince. "So then, I shouted at them 'are you trying to kill me?' They looked a bit stunned, and then they gave me some new – frilly and pink – clothes and I freaked out, they took this as me being violent and aimed some weird snake bows at me and said that this was how I thanked them after they'd saved me, so, naturally I said 'thanks.' They then said that they would still have to kill me because there was a 'no-man' rule on the island, and all men that set foot there had to be killed."

"So they saved you only to try to kill you?" Ace asked incredulously.

"Yeah."

"But you're still here (thank god) so what happened?" Sabo asked curiously.

"Well, asking them not to kill me didn't work so I escaped through the roof. Then I realised, while dodging their attacks, that the vivre card was still in my pocket – in my shorts that Margret was holding. So I grabbed her and jumped out of the mountain crater – that's where the village was. We landed safely thanks to fuusen."

"Ooh~. That defence that you were working on around ten years ago? You finished it?" Sabo asked.

"Yup." Ace and Luffy chirped.

"So Margret gave the vivre card back and told me that the island was in the Calm belt, so the only ship they had belonged to the Kuja pirates and it was pulled by Yuda – poisonous serpent sea kings that no other sea kings would go near. After failing to make a raft, and almost getting killed by Haki powered (whatever that is) arrows that Margret shot at me, I decided to go ask this empress if she would give me a lift to Shabondy or at least the nearest non-Calm belt island."

Ace and Sabo frowned slightly – Luffy could be quite naïve sometimes.

"So I went back to the village, and the empress was back so I went to the tallest building – which is where I thought the empress would be. And…I kinda…misjudged my fall…and crashed through the roof, into her bathroom–"

"What?!" Sabo yelled, "Luffy!"

"– while she was bathing."

Ace and Sabo blinked before simultaneously pinching themselves and thanking the heavens that their little brother was so innocent and naïve.

"Anyway, I saw this symbol on her back – they referred to it as the 'Gorgon's eye', that it was a curse that turned anyone who saw it to stone – she didn't like the fact that I had seen it, around that time her sisters ran in. the empress attacked me with this pink beam – I thought that it was like a guy called Foxy's power, which slowed things down – so I froze…but nothing happened. So she tried again…and nothing happened. The sisters yelled something about 'it being impossible to resist their sister's beauty – especially after seeing her naked – so my fear must be what was stopping the beam from working.' Why would seeing a girl naked make you like them more?"

Ace and Sabo smiled – only Luffy could see the empress Boa Hancock naked and then have no reaction whatsoever – Luffy was so innocent.

"Then I tried to escape but she (the empress) shot me in mid air with this bullet that my rubber powers couldn't rebound. The shot brought me down and – after tying me up with snakes (weird) – they took me to the arena to be eaten alive by this giant panther as punishment for setting foot on the island. Then Margret and two others – a tall giant lady called Alphelandra and a medium sized, slightly fat lady called Sweet pea – jumped down to the arena and tried to take the blame for bringing me onto the island. The empress used the pink beam again and turned them into stone."

Ace and Sabo looked horrified at this – how could she do that to her own crew members – the ones that had done everything for her. Their second thought was 'thank god Luffy is so innocent; otherwise he would be a statue right now.'

"After that I got really mad. So when Bacura (the giant panther) was released…I knocked it out with one punch. I then screamed at the crowd and the empress, asking how they could cheer and laugh when their nakama had been turned to stone. The empress then stood up and said 'because I am beautiful.'"

'Geez' Ace thought, 'how arrogant _is_ she?' Sabo was thinking along the same lines, with an added 'Luffy's not gonna like that.'

"I told her that she pissed me off and she swayed and said something about 'not standing my existence' and told her sisters to get rid of me."

Ace was furious 'How dare she?!' he thought, 'Thant's our little bro! Leave him alone you witch!'

Sabo's thoughts were _very_ similar but also had aspects revolving around 'how to prevent Ace from killing her' but 'making sure that the witch knew not to mess with their little bro.'

"So then they came down and revealed their zoan snake forms while I mover Margret and her friends out of the battle zone. Anyways, the battle started and I couldn't land a clean hit on them. They could predict my attacks and block all of them. It was a little like what happened on Skypia. I was trying to remember what I did back then when Sandersonia – the green haired sister – go Margret. Marigold – the other sister – had caught me and Sandersonia went to drop Margret, I kept on shouting at her to stop and then there was this…wave of power thingy and she stopped."

Sabo gaped – Luffy has the King's Disposition! Ace had a smug loon on his face because Luffy had the King's Haki just like him!

"A lot of people in the arena randomly fainted – weird right – and Sandersonia and Marigold put me and Margret down. I laughed and said that they were nice people after all. After I'd moved Margret out of the way again, I decided to get serious; I went into gear second."

"What's that?" Sabo asked, with Ace nodding in his agreement of the question.

"A power up. I get faster, stronger; all of my moves become more powerful in general. So I went into gear second and I could hit them – they couldn't keep up with my speed and strength. So they pulled out their strongest attacks - -Sandersonia's hair turned into snakes and Marigold's lit on fire like a salamander! They tried to hit me with their moves but I jumped backwards and did 'Jet Gatling' and their attacks were stopped and put out. Then I tied their tails together and they fell into each other and Sandersonia's clothes were set on fire. She fell towards the pit of spikes that surrounded the whole arena – between the stands and the fighting area – but she managed to catch onto the edge, but her cloak that hid her back had burned off. So I jumped onto her back and hid the mark with my body, the arena was then evacuated and Marigold helped Sandersonia get back up. Then the empress offered to either give me a lift to Shabondy or to turn Margret, Sweet Pea and Alphelandra back to normal. I said 'really you would turn them back – thanks.' But they looked really shocked for some reason."

"Of course they would Lu; you made a selfless decision in less time than it takes to blink." Sabo said, while Ace smiled fondly – Lu always put others before himself.

"After Hancock turned them back to normal we all went back to their palacy-thing and they had me sit and wait for a little while in front of this curtain. When they told me to go in Hancock was naked again, then she turned around and showed me the mark on her back again – I don't really want to describe it but it looks like a hoof – she asked me where I'd seen it before and ' said that I'd seen something similar but it wasn't the same. She told me that the mark was that of a slave of the tennryuubito."

Sabo and Ace grit their teeth – they hated the tennryuubito in general, but mostly for spitting them apart as kids.

"They were freed by someone – can't remember who, something to do with a fish and a tiger – and they came to Amazon Lily. I can't say anymore 'cause they asked me not to. Later we had a big party and there was lots of dancing and meat, really _really_ _good_ meat. Soon after that I learnt about your execution ace and decided to go to Impel Down and break you out. Hancock offered to help – she got me into Impel Down."

"Wait," Ace held up a hand, "Boa Hancock – man hater – helped you?!" He asked incredulously.

"Yeah – she kept blushing and mentioning love and fate around me as well. Weird."

Ace's mind was screaming, 'Paedophile alert! Paedophile alert! Hancock is 30, Luffy is 17! There's a 13 year age gap!'

Sabo's wasn't much better – he locked his gaze with Ace's and they both made a silent promise to give Hancock a talking to if they ever saw her again.

"Lu?" Ace asked in a small voice, bringing Sabo out of his 'Paedophilic Hancock' thoughts, "Why did you try to rescue me?"

"Your vivre card was burning," Luffy said, looking down at his hands, "You were hurt, your vivre card was barely the size of my thumb print – you're my brother – I couldn't let you die! Not after–"

Luffy's voice choked slightly and tapered off – even though Sabo hadn't died 10 years ago, the pain of his 'death' couldn't just be erased or forgotten that easily.

Sabo frowned and gently wrapped his arms around Luffy's waist, pulling his little brother flush against his chest; Luffy simply fisted his hands into Sabo's coat and nuzzled into his shoulder. Ace smiled and joined the hug after a few seconds – wrapping his arms around his brothers, leaning into Sabo and resting his head on Luffy's.

The comfortable silence was soon filled by Luffy's soft snores. Sabo and Ace shared a small smile at their little brother's ability to sleep almost anywhere, before settling down on the sand to follow Luffy into the Sandman's domain. Sabo was lying on his back, with one arm firmly wrapped around Luffy – who was sleeping on his chest – and the other around Ace – who was lying on his side and using Sabo's shoulder as a pillow. One of Luffy's hands was fisted into Sabo's coat and the other was intertwined with Ace's. Ace had his other hand linked with Sabo's, which was resting on Ace's hip. Their hats lay discarded in the sand next to them as they dreamed of the many childhood adventures that they'd had together.

**0000**

Ace and Sabo woke to the sound of vomiting, it only took them a few seconds to confirm just _who_ the vomiting sound was coming from, and they quickly scrambled to their feet, running in the direction of the noise, looking desperately for their little brother.

They found Luffy doubled over within the tree line, his thin form trembling as he attempted to throw up his stomach. Ace and Sabo were at his side in an instant, gently holding back his hair away from his face, while rubbing soothing circles on his back and stomach.

After Luffy had finished trying to throw up his intestines, and everything in between, Ace gently and slowly lifted his – still trembling – little brother into his arms to rest, comfortably, against his shoulder. He was about to carry Lu back to where they had left their stuff – hats and random bits – when Sabo stopped him and ran off with a shout of, "Wait there!"

He reappeared less than a minute later and was holding all of their random bits, along with all three of their hats, Sabo then motioned for Ace to follow and headed into the trees. After a few minutes of dodging and weaving through the trees and various shrubs, they came to a small fresh water stream, running along a rocky cliff side and ran into a large pool of water. After adjusting his hold on Luffy, Ace followed Sabo around the pool and under some thick vines overhanging the cliff side, and into a cool and uninhabited cave.

"How did you find this?" Ace whispered, slightly in awe.

"When we were out looking for any signs of civilisation." Sabo answered, as he dumped the stuff he'd been carrying on the floor, hats included, and started to rummage through his small duffel bag. He pulled out a large blanket and a spare set of clothes along with the medi-kit, which he set to the side for the moment, before laying the spare clothes on the cave floor and arranging them into a weird mattress/nest hybrid. Ace, catching on, set Luffy down on the improvised bed and draped Sabo's blanket over his little brother's small form.

"Ace," Sabo whispered, reaching for the medi-kit, "sit Lu up and face him this way please. And do it as gently as possible."

Ace complied – Sabo had always been their improvised doctor when they were little – he sat Luffy up before shuffling behind him, so that when he let go Luffy would lean against his chest and stay upright. Sabo then shuffled over, with the medi-kit in one hand and a thermometer in the other. It hadn't taken him long to find it, nearly all of the supplies that the medi-kit had previously help had been depleted, having been used to bandage and cover up most of Luffy and Ace's bigger injuries.

Luffy blinked blearily at his brothers, eyes trying to see through his fevered haze, slowly wandering between their worried faces and the thermometer in Sabo's hand. Sabo took this opportunity to gently tilt his little brother's face upwards, pressing the thermometer wordlessly against Luffy's lips, and silently asking for Luffy to be obedient for once. Luffy silently complied, opening he mouth and the closing it around the thermometer.

Sabo counted to 100 before removing the device and inspecting the reading. He swore under his breath. Luffy leant back into Ace, who gently covered his ears before leaning towards Sabo and whispering, "How is it?"

"Bad," Sabo replied, "104°"

Ace's eyed widened before staring worriedly at his little brother, whose breathing was laboured and coming out in short ragged gasps. He gently removed his hands from Luffy's ears and wrapped an arm around his waist, placing a cool hand on Lu's forehead, and turning to Sabo mouthing 'what do we do?'

"Keep him stable," Sabo whispered, "a cool cloth on his forehead for a start. Maybe some food, something stodgy that he can keep down. But first we need to ask him some questions."

"Questions? Why?" Ace whispered back.

"I can't treat him until I know the cause, and whether he's had treatment before. If it's an infected wound though...then we'll have to cauterise it."

Ace flinched, they'd had to cauterise one of Luffy's wounds before, when Luffy was little, he did **not**, under _any_ circumstances, want to repeat that experience.

Sabo, aware of his brother's turmoil, turned to Luffy, who was restlessly dozing in Ace's arms. He gently shook his little brother awake – shushing Luffy's sleepy bitching – and began to quickly and softly question his fevered brother.

"Ok Luffy, answer a couple of questions for us and I _promise you _that you can sleep for as long as you want as soon as we're don. Okay?" Sabo asked gently, not wanting to push Luffy when he was vulnerable.

"'Kay." Luffy mumbled.

"Lu, have you come into contact with any bad food or poisons at any time in the near past?" Sabo asked.

"Yeah…in 'mpel d'wn…M'gdell'n was a pois'n man." Luffy murmured, curling into Ace for warmth.

'Shit,' Sabo thought, 'Magdellan's ruthless, he would've hit Lu with the strongest poison he's got!' He did not voice these thoughts; Ace would've gone nuts if he did, instead he asked "Lu, did you get treated for the poison?"

"Yeah," Luffy yawned, "Iva-chan treat'd me."

"Did he say anything about any after effects?"

"…said th't tha pois'n's not all g'ne…'e said th't I migh' be s'ck for a while…"

Sabo and Ace sighed in relief; Luffy was only getting the tail-end of the poison…he could just sleep it off, but they couldn't give him anything, lest it make him worse. They just had to make Lu as comfortable as possible and wait it out.

He exchanged a relieved smile with Ace, linking his hand with Luffy's and gently told the sleepy teen that the questioning was over and that he could sleep now.

Luffy was out like a light, silently snuggling into Ace whilst holding Sabo's hand in an iron grip. Ace merely smiled at his (admittedly cute) little brother and wrapped Sabo's blanket firmly around Luffy's shoulders, sending another small smile towards Sabo. He smile was returned – Luffy wasn't out of the woods yet, but he was okay not _okay _okay but okay, and right not that was all that mattered to them.

**END**

**A/N: So, how was it? Please review…oh and for all those waiting for the sequel to 'ITTAI NANI GA?!' Please be patient, I hope to get it to you as soon as possible. **

**Tenebrae**


	15. Surprises

**A/N: I will wait for one more chapter for anyone trying to guess who 'Des' is, and I will reveal his true identity next chapter. For now, please read this little ficlet and enjoy!**

**Surprises**

**Four times Monkey D Luffy surprised his crew and one time that he didn't.**

**Number one…**

Sanji sighed; Usopp was being down right annoying lately. Even more than Luffy, and his Captain was the most annoying person that he knew, well, before Usopp went all morbid anyway.

"What's he upset about anyway?" Sanji asked to no-one in particular, as the whole crew – bar the annoying sniper – holed up in the kitchen, waiting for the long-nosed idiot to break out of his depressing aura.

"It's his and his girlfriend's anniversary, it's been a year since they got together, and he can't be there to celebrate it with her." Nami explained, absently painting Robin's nails while waiting.

"I didn't even know that the shitty sniper had a girlfriend." Sanji mused.

"Yeah, she's a girl from his village, her name is Kaya." Zoro, told him, for once, not bothering to antagonise the cook.

"Wow," Franky muttered, "Didn't think Usopp would be the boyfriend type, considering that he's a pirate and all."

"You're a pirate too." Chopper pointed out, gaining a nod from the cyborg.

"Do you think that she would let me see her panties?" Brook asked.

Zoro shrugged, "Whatever, I just want him to stop being so annoying….why is he being so annoying anyway?" He asked to the air.

"It's love." Robin explained.

"So?" Zoro said, raising an eyebrow.

"Well love is….." Robin started, pausing to try and explain what love was.

"Love is like your Wado Ichimonji, so precious to you that you'd never willingly give it up; but you take it for granted and then need it when it's gone."

Seven heads snapped around to look at their captain in shock and surprise; they were still trying to comprehend what he had just said, and the fact that it was their – usually dumb and idiotic – captain who had said it.

Robin snapped out of it first, "Yes captain-san, that is quite an accurate comparison." She praised, before turning to Zoro ad asking whether the comparison helped and if he got it now.

Zoro nodded, still trying to comprehend that it was _Luffy_ who had made said comparison.

Luffy then stood, snapping the rest of his crew out of their induced stupors, and murmuring that he was going to go talk to Usopp before turning round and walking out of the door.

Robin turned to the rest of the crew and smiled, "Captain-san sure is surprising." She stated.

"I'll say." They chorused back, still staring at the closed kitchen door.

**0000**

**Number two…**

Nami sighed, why had she entered them into this contest anyway? Her knuckle-headed crew were rubbish at doing any sort of creative writing – except Robin of course, but she was watching over the ship that moored at a beach far away from the contest here and was therefore unable to participate – they were doomed to fail.

The aim of the contest was to create three poems in an hour and then submit them, the best one would be chosen by a panel of judges and the writer of that poem would receive three million bellis. Three million! So she had submitted the whole crew as one team and they were now armed with pens and paper and waiting for the bell that would signal the start of the writing phase of the contest. There was only one flaw in her plan, none of them were any good at writing poems, so she had resigned herself to losing the three mil with teary eyes.

Ding.

The bell to signal the start of the contest rang and Nami turned to face her crew,

"Right," she said resolutely, "I know that we're all shit at writing poems, but if you don't write at least one each then I will up all of your debts by 200 percent!" She yelled with belli signs in her eyes.

Her statement was met with a number of groans and one 'Yes Nami-swan', as they turned to their papers and started to write.

Half an hour into the contest, Nami stood up from her seated position on the grass and went to survey what the crew had already come up with.

To put it gently, they were all shit. Zoro's was just a load of repeating words, Sanji's was far too focused on women, Chopper's was all about surgery and was far too descriptive, Usopp's was a ballad of all of his 'accomplishments', Brook's was all about panties, Franky's was all about the Sunny and hers was far too money focused. She turned to Luffy, who was absently doodling on his paper while muttering, and wrote him off as a lost cause. Then his words hit her,

"The ship raced across the sky, like an eagle flying high, how I wonder how it flies, a ship racing across the sky." He half sang, doodling something that looked like the Sunny-go on his paper.

Nami blinked, shook her head and blinked again. Had she really just heard that?

She decided not to look a gift horse in the mouth and grabbed some nearby paper and a spare pen and sat down on the grass next to her captain, straining her ears to hear his muttering as she wrote down the words that he had said earlier.

She worked furiously for the next twenty minutes, writing down all of Luffy's little mutterings before spending the last ten minutes of their time choosing the three that they would submit for the judging stage.

And when they won the contest, Nami rushed over to the judge to collect her money before rushing back to the crew and enveloped her captain in a huge hug. She didn't let go for the rest of the day, and, as she was holding onto his neck and making it very difficult to walk, Luffy was forced to carry her back to the Sunny-go, with Sanji yelling at him to 'let his sweet Nami-swan go' despite the fact that _she_ was holding onto _him_!

Nami enjoyed every second of the hug, and she hoped that Luffy did too because he was the whole reason for getting her that prize money….even if the fact that Luffy could actually think up a poem was mind boggling in the first place.

**0000**

**Number three…**

Zoro struggled against the chains holding him to the wall of the cell, futilely wrenching against the chains in the hopes of breaking them so that he could free the others and escape. But they would not budge, and all he managed to accomplish was to create an annoying clanking sound as the chains brushed against each other. This only served to irritate his crew, who promptly told him to stop before he hurt himself or they would hurt him.

Huffing, Zoro turned to the rest of the crew to see what they were doing; Nami and Robin were sitting in a corner chatting, Sanji was throwing praises at them from his spot in the opposite corner, Usopp and Chopper were making funny faces at each other in the middle of the cell and Luffy was…..Luffy was….

"Luffy what the hell are you doing and how the hell are you doing it?" Zoro asked, staring incredulously at his captain who was sitting in the last unoccupied corner.

Another 5 sets of eyes snapped round to face their captain – well 4 and a half if you count Sanji – only to stare at him with their jaws on the floor.

"Luffy…" Nami started.

"Yes?" Said rubber teen answered, turning slightly to face her.

"I thought you had sea stone cuffs on." She continued.

"I do." Luffy answered, confused about where this conversation was going.

"Then how the hell…..how are you…." She waved her hands, furiously trying to tell him what she meant.

"What she means, Luffy, is how are you picking the lock of your cuffs?" Robin tried to explain.

"Well Ace taught me how to pick locks when I was little…" Luffy told her, still picking the lock.

"What Robin means," Zoro interrupted, as he was getting frustrated with the conversation, "Is, how are you picking the lock with your _feet_ when said lock is _behind your back_?"

"I'm using a hairpin that I found in my pocket, besides I've always been flexible, even before I ate the rubber rubber fruit." Luffy explained, his tongue sticking out of his mouth as he concentrated on picking the lock to his cuffs.

"There's flexible," Sanji nodded towards Luffy, "And then there's what you're doing."

"I'm also double-jointed." Luffy added, as if that explained everything.

"Well, why haven't we ever seen this before?" Nami asked, a tad curious.

"I'm made of rubber."

"We know that," She snapped, "But why didn't we know about your natural flexibility before."

"_I'm made of rubber_."

"Oh," Usopp gasped in realisation, "Since you're rubber, you're flexible anyway, so the double-jointed thing never really shows, and it's not as if you make a habit of wearing sea stone cuffs on a regular basis." Usopp explained.

"Yeah." Luffy muttered, face screwed up in concentration before a small click met the ears of the rest of the crew, and Luffy's cuffs fell to the floor.

Luffy made haste, quickly moving over to Robin and Nami and furiously working on their cuffs for a tense minute, until they too fell to the floor with a dull clank.

Luffy then moved on to Zoro, and then to Sanji, Chopper and Usopp, methodically working at their cuffs until all of his crew were free and rubbing their wrists to regain some sort of circulation. Then he turned to the cell door, pulling out another hairpin and inserting it into the lock. He fiddled with it for a few minutes, with the rest of his crew watching him like hawk, until the door swung open with a satisfying creek. He turned and grinned at his crew, before sliding away the hairpins, and sprinting out the door, with his crew not far behind him.

Zoro made a vow, then and there, never to underestimate his captain again.

**0000**

**Number four…**

"PRAEDONIBUS!" The man yelled, pointing wildly at them.

"For the last time, we can't understand what you're saying!" Usopp yelled back.

Chopper sighed, they had brought this man onboard after finding him drifting on a plank of wood, they had nursed him back to health, and yet, as soon as he woke up, he yelled at them. To make matters worse, they had no idea _what_ he was saying.

"Ok, ok." Nami muttered to herself, "Let's try this again, what is your name?" She asked, miming out the words.

But to no avail, the man kept on yelling at them, gesturing wildly and repeating the word 'praedonibus' over and over again.

Nami finally admitted defeat, dragging herself over to Robin and flopping down on the chair next to the older woman.

"Do you know what he's saying, Robin?" Nami half asked half groaned.

"I have no idea." Robin admitted, not liking the fact that she had no idea what language the man was speaking, let alone what he was actually saying.

Suddenly there was a loud slam as Luffy stomped out of the galley, the shouting had obviously woken him from his nap, and he was not happy. He stomped over to where Usopp and the man were having their dual language shouting match and promptly punched them both into the deck.

"SOME OF US ARE TRYING TO SLEEP! WILL YOU SHUT UP!?" He yelled with an obvious tick mark on his forehead.

Usopp quietly picked himself off of the floor and slunk away; not wanting to deal with a sleep deprived Luffy, but the man leapt up from the floor and continued to shout at the enraged pirate captain, not knowing the danger of dealing with Luffy when he was this angry.

Robin, Sanji, Zoro, Chopper, Usopp and Nami all watched as more and more tick marks appeared on Luffy's face; it was like watching a train crash, you didn't want to watch but you couldn't look away. Luffy lasted another 3 minutes, but eventually the inevitable happened and he snapped.

"OPPLIO JAM!" He yelled at the man, stunning him – and the whole crew – into silence.

"_Can't you be fucking quiet; some people are trying to sleep here!" _He continued.

"_You can speak my language?" _The man asked hopefully, the rest of the crew simply stared as they had no idea what their captain had just said.

"_No, you're hallucinating. Of course I can speak your language." _Luffy replied.

"_Thank God! I was starting to think that everyone on this ship would be talking gibberish." _The man cried.

"_Well, I am not. Now can you shut up so that I can have my nap?!" _Luffy growled.

"_Of course. But, just one more thing?" _The man said pleadingly.

"_What?"_ Luffy grumbled, he was _not_ in the mood for this right now.

"_What are you going to do with me?" _The man asked, with a hint of fear in his eyes.

"_We are dumping you off at the nearest inhabited island, period." _Luffy grumbled.

"_Thank you." _The man smiled gratefully.

"_Yeah, yeah. Just don't make any loud noises, I want my nap."_ Luffy yawned dismissively as he turned abruptly and made a beeline for the boys' cabin, slamming the door behind him sharply.

The rest of his crew on deck blinked at his abrupt exit…and entrance for that matter.

"He never ceases to surprise." Robin stated fondly.

"Amen to that." Chopper easily agreed, with the rest of the crew distractedly nodding along, most of them still looking at the foreign man and the door that Luffy had walked through seconds before.

**0000**

**Number five…**

Monkey D Luffy had always been one to put others' needs before himself, among his nakama he was known to be kind hearted, idiotic, selfless, sometimes insufferable, naïve, strong, practically fearless, stupid, dumb, sometimes awe inspiring and generally annoying. Among his enemies he was known to be insufferable, always in the way, insanity incarnate, practically immortal (judging from the way that on one occasion he had been impaled, then buried alive and then had all the water sucked out of him and had _still_ bounced back and kicked his opponent's ass), insanely strong (being stick thin and yet he _still_ managed to push buildings apart), incredibly dedicated to his nakama (he had stormed Enies Lobby with only a handful of crew members and a few dozen thugs, then singled-handily defeated 2 members of the CP9 – including their boss –, then survived a Buster Call, all to get back a single member of his crew…needless to say, Enies Lobby hadn't been the same since), an incredibly dumb idiot with genius level battle instinct and generally all round annoying.

Considering all of his titles and how well known he was by the time he had reached the last island before the New World – Shabondy Archipelago –, it was no wonder that he had become a little bit of a legend; he was the man said to have taken down at least 2 Shichibukai and saved several islands and countries from the tyranny that they had previously been submitted to. He had also been said to have defeated a god – some said that his name was Enel and that he controlled lightning, – but this was never checked or verified it was a well known fact that he had stormed Enies Lobby with his handful of crew members (also said to be just as insane if not as strong as their captain) and had rescued Nico Robin from the CP9.

His hatred of bigotry and people who treated his friends badly was also well known. So it came to no surprise when the rest of the world learned that he had punched a tennryuubito in the face – well, the government and the nobles were _very_ surprised, as they couldn't see why _anyone_ could hate the tennryuubito –, it also very not surprising when Monkey D Luffy and his crew later escaped the island of Shabondy without being captured by the admiral Kizaru, who had been deployed as soon as word hit the marines that a few tennryuubito had been hurt and then kidnapped by said Straw hat crew.

Also, later on, it came to no surprise when Monkey D Luffy later stormed Impel Down, successfully breaking in and then out of the legendary 'inescapable' prison, with a few hundred prisoners in tow. Some of these prisoners were very high level – among them were former Shichibukai Jimbe and Crocodile and revolutionary Iva and Inazuma –, the fact that he had broken in to the prison to rescue his brother, Portgas D Ace, was also not surprising. The fact that he later led all of these escapees, leading them to Marineford to fight along with Whitebeard to rescue his brother, only surprised the few that were too stupid to see that Monkey D Luffy was almost unstoppable when it came to his friends and family.

What _was_ surprising about the whole Marineford affair was the fact that Monkey D Luffy _failed_ to save his brother and then disappeared from the battle field without a trace. Many knew that Monkey D Luffy was not dead at this point, and he later showed it by returning to Marineford to pay his respects to his dead brother and all those who had died during the war of the best. This was surprising to the whole world save a few, these few being his 8 nakama and those who had taken him back to Marineford. His nakama were not at all surprised by Luffy's return, deep down they had been expecting it, and his hidden message to them was also expected.

After Marineford Monkey D Luffy disappeared for 2 years; hiding away from the world on a small island in the Calm Belt. During this period he was almost forgotten and many tried to use his name for their own means, 8 people and one fox-thing went so far as to imitate the legendary crew for their own means. But Monkey D Luffy could not and would not go unforgotten for long, after 2 long years he finally emerged from his seclusion, landing at Shabondy Archipelago exactly 2 years after his disappearance, with all 8 members of his crew with him. He soon showed the world that he was not dead, and the fake crew that had used his name for 2 years were very quickly dealt with, along with all of the marines dispatched to try and capture him as he left Paradise.

These actions surprised the world immensely, they wondered why had would come out of hiding when he had been safe to start a new life, away from piracy and all of the threats that came with it.

His crew, however, were not surprised. He may have shocked the world for the last 2 years but he could not shock them. Luffy had always been a bit like an open book to them, they occasionally found secret passages and hidden documents but the overall content of the book was well known to them. So when he had greeted his crew, after 2 years apart, with a 'sorry for being so selfish' talk, they had snorted and had told him that if he thought that he hadn't been selfish before the 2 year gap he was sorely mistaken. The whole conversation had been quickly forgotten in favour of setting off for Fish-man Island.

Over those 2 years apart the whole Straw Hat crew had gotten stronger, different and more mature. But not one of them had been surprised by any of their captain's actions, not one bit, which just showed how well they knew him. No matter how far apart they were, the Mugiwaras were the most close knit pirate crew in the whole Grand Line…and this didn't surprise the world in the slightest.

**END**

**A/N: This one was a little different from my previous fics, but I still want to know what you thought of it. So reviews please!**

**Tenebrae **


	16. City!

**A/N: I did say that I would reveal the true identity of 'Des' in this chapter….but after a bit of consideration I decided to give you one more clue, along with summing up all the hidden clues I included in the original chapter. I mentioned the fates, death, bringing people back from the dead, the fact that he (Des) is over 2 million years old and that he is 'the devil.' Those who have said that Des is death or the devil are really close but you just need to think a little more out of the box. So my last clue to you is this; 'Des' is a well known mythological figure, he has a few other names (one of which is a planet) and he is well known for two features, one of which can be considered as one of the seven sins, and the other was mentioned in my first list of clues. The first person to review with the answer to my question of 'who is DES?' gets a present! So get thinking people! But for now, enjoy! **

**BTW, Sabo is alive in this fic…just thought I'd tell you beforehand. So just read and enjoy. **

**City!**

Ace sighed contentedly, snuggling into the nest of blankets and pillows beneath him while pulling the warm body next to him flush against his chest, softly combing his long fingers through his little brother's messy black locks. Luffy practically melted under his ministrations, relaxing his body backwards until it hit a second warm body behind him. Sabo smiled warmly, wrapping his long arms around both of his brothers and leading all three D brothers into a warm and relaxed hug.

"You really shouldn't be sleeping on the deck." Nami scolded lightly, not being able to stop the smile that graced her face as she watched the brothers' antics.

"Whatever." Luffy mumbled, slipping into a light doze induced by the warm weather and the even warmer three way hug.

The brotherly bonding continued in comfortable silence, that is, until Luffy started to hum. It was quiet at first, no louder than breathing, but it soon increased in volume until it could easily be heard from the other side of the ship. What was even stranger about the humming was that, after a few minutes of Luffy humming the same tune over and over again, Ace and Sabo joined in. Adding their own little tunes on top of their little brother's, synching all three little melodies until the rest of crew on deck (meaning everyone as they had been drawn onto the deck by the humming) could no longer follow each individual tune, and they actually started to enjoy it!

Therefore, they were all very put out when the humming started to fade as all three brothers finished their tunes.

"Was that all spontaneous?" Usopp asked, jaw dropping when the brothers nodded, "You should start a band or something, you're really good at making up songs."

He frowned when Ace and Luffy burst out laughing; Sabo was a little more conserved but still chuckled along with his brothers.

"What did I say?" Usopp asked, surprised at their reactions.

"No it's not what you said, well it is, but the thing is, we've already started a band." Sabo answered, still chuckling, "We're quite famous in the Grand Line actually, not so much in the Blues, but our autographs will still sell for quite a lot of money."

"Wait, what?!" Nami yelled, "You mean that, to pay off all of his food expenses, then all I had to do was sell a few of his autographs?!"

"Yeah, but since Luffy is terrified of fan girls (and boys for that matter), then getting an autograph in the first place would be a miracle." Sabo said, and then laughed as Ace shuddered in his arms, muttering something about 'man-eating monsters' and 'practically being stripped by their eyes.'

Luffy, meanwhile, had started to hyperventilate. Prompting Ace to tighten his grip on his little brother, rubbing soothing circles on the teen's back and gently emphasizing that the 'man-eating monsters' were gone and that 'they'll never get within 10ft of you again, if I can help it.'

Sabo winced at his little brother's reaction, but let Ace deal with the matter – the flame user had always been very good at calming their little brother.

Luffy's crew also winced, but decided not to pry and to change the subject before anything bad happened to their captain.

"So," Nami asked eyes gleaming, "Can you perform for us?"

Sabo blinked, surprised at this turn of events, "Well, it depends. Do you have 3 mics, a drum set, a guitar, bass and a keyboard?" He asked, not expecting an answer.

"Of course." Brook said, "I am a musician after all."

"Really?!" Sabo cried, more than surprised that Luffy's crew had that many instruments on board, "Well, okay then." He shrugged, nudging Ace and Luffy out of their huggle session and standing up. He and Luffy moved all of the pillows and blankets out of the way while Ace made the arrangements for the performance.

"One song only." Ace told Nami, smug smirk plastered to his face.

"Five." Nami retorted.

"Five?! Are you insane?! We'll do two and no further." Ace responded.

"Four and we'll throw in some meat." Nami bartered.

"Two and that's my final offer." Ace said, not falling for the navigator's scheme.

"Three and we'll throw in Sanji's patented barbe-Q sauce." Robin added in.

"Done." Ace agreed, shaking hands with the archaeologist, and then walking over to his brothers, who were now setting up all of the instruments on the grassy deck.

"We're doing three songs; we need to pick which ones we're gonna do." Ace told them quietly.

"Why don't we just pick one each and then play that? Provided that we can still play that song of course." Sabo suggested.

"Okay." Luffy and Ace agreed.

"What d'you wanna do then?" Sabo asked, slightly curious.

"Well I want to do 'City!'" Ace announced.

"Of course you would," Sabo sighed, "Well I want to do 'I don't wanna die."

"Okay," Luffy chirped, "Well, then I'm doing 'Young.'"

"Okay~." Sabo and Ace drawled, slightly surprised by their little brother's choice of song.

"Right, let's go then!" Luffy yelled, all set for the performance.

"Remember Lu that you have to switch between the bass and the keyboard." Ace reminded.

"Yeah yeah." Luffy waved dismissively, walking over to the keyboard and bass.

"Right then, let's do this thing!" Ace yelled, picking up the electric guitar.

"If I never hear you say that again, it will be too soon." Sabo deadpanned, making a beeline for the drums.

"Right then," Ace started, addressing the 8 pirates lounging on the grass a little way away from them, "We will play three songs for you, as agreed, and the first one is called 'Young.'"

Luffy started off on the piano, plucking at the keys before starting to sing,

"_I see the children in the rain like the parade before the pain.  
I see the love; I see the hate; I see this world that we can make!  
I see the life I see the sky. Give it all to see you fly...  
Yes! we wave this flag of hatred, but you're the ones who made it!  
Watch the beauty of all our lies passing right before my eyes.  
I hear the hate in all your words all the wars to make us hurt  
We get so sick, oh, so sick; we never wanted all this  
Medication for the kids with no reason to live!_"

He sang, Sabo joining in with the drum beat a few words in.

"_So we  
March to the drums of the damned as we come  
Watch it burn in the sun - we are numb!_"

Luffy switched to the bass, with Ace adding his own guitar piece along with Sabo's drums and Luffy's voice and bass.

"_**We are young!  
But we have heart  
Born in this world as it all falls apart  
We are strong  
We don't belong  
Born in this world as it all falls apart**_"

Ace and Sabo joined in, adding their voices to Luffy's.

_"As we walk among these shadows, in these streets, these fields of battle  
Take it up, we wear the medal; raise your hands with burning candles.  
Hear us whisper in the dark, in the rain you see the spark  
Feel the beating of our hearts fleeting hope as we depart  
All together, walk alone against all we've ever known  
All we've ever really wanted was a place to call our home  
But you take all we are; the innocence of our hearts.  
Make us kneel before the altar as you tear us apart!_

_So we_  
_March to the drums of the damned as we come_  
_Watch it burn in the sun - we are numb!_"

Luffy continued as he returned to the keyboard, with the pace of the song increasing slightly as he moved on to the next verse and he switched back to the bass.

"_**We are young!  
But we have heart  
Born in this world as it all falls apart  
We are strong  
We don't belong  
Born in this world as it all falls apart" **_

Ace and Sabo joined in again for the chorus and the rest of the Mugiwaras found themselves enjoying their exclusive performance immensely.

"_We will fight or we will fall_" Luffy sang.  
"**'til the angels save us all**" Ace and Sabo added in their line.

"_We will fight or we will fall_"  
"**'til the angels save us all**"

"_We will fight or we will fall_"  
"**'til the angels save us all**"

"We will fight or we will fall"  
"**'til the angels save us all...**"

"_**We are young!  
But we have heart  
Born in this world as it all falls apart  
We are strong  
We don't belong  
Born in this world as it all falls apart**_

**_We are young!_**  
**_But we have heart_**  
**_Born in this world as it all falls apart_**  
**_We are strong_**  
**_We don't belong_**  
**_Born in this world as it all falls apart!_**"

The three brothers finished off the last line, with Ace's guitar piece being the last to finish, fading out as the song drew to a close.

The 8 pirates sitting on the grass immediately started clapping, some (like Franky, Usopp, Chopper and Brook) cheered and screamed, others (like Robin, Sanji and Zoro) merely clapped but were obviously very entertained by the song and one (coughNamicough) had belli signs in her eyes.

Sabo and Ace frowned, noticing the belli signs in the navigator's eyes, and cut off her train of thought,

"If we ever find any videos of this performance anywhere, then we will sue you for every belli you have for copyright infringement." Sabo said, still frowning.

"And if you ever force or coerce or otherwise make Lu perform for you so that you can get some quick cash, we will personally make sure that Luffy gets every single belli from your treasure trove as payment for his performance." Ace added, outright glaring at the red-head, "And these conditions go for the rest of the crew as well, mess with our band and you'll be paying off debts that make the one's Nami gives you look like pocket change."He finished.

Nami quickly nodded, as did the rest of the crew; the threat of being penniless for the rest of their lives was a great incentive.

"Right then," Ace chirped, his personality doing a complete 180, "Our next song is 'I don't wanna die.'"

Luffy started it off again, playing the opening melody before he switched to the bass and Sabo and Ace joined in on the drums and guitar,

"_I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die  
I don't wanna die so you're gonna have to  
I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die  
No I don't wanna die so you're gonna have to  
Blood is getting hotter, body's getting colder  
I told you once I'm the only one who holds her  
I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die  
I don't wanna die so you're gonna have to_."

Luffy sang, with a slight morbid undertone to his voice.

"**I look inside of myself and try to find someone else  
Someone who's willin' to die as to watch you crying for help  
I know that blood will be spilled and if you won't then I will  
My grave will never be filled it's either kill or be killed  
So let heaven be told that some may come some may go  
Where I'll end up I don't know but I ain't dyin' alone  
I keep on asking the question can I be saved by confession  
You see this blood on my hands at least they're still reachin' to heaven  
I got to pick up the pieces I gotta bury 'em deep  
And when you look in my eyes I'll be the last thing you'll see**."

Sabo sang his piece; unlike Luffy his voice had an angry undertone.

"_I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die  
I don't wanna die so you're gonna have to  
I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die  
No I don't wanna die so you're gonna have to  
Blood is getting hotter, body's getting colder  
I told you once I'm the only one who holds her  
I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die  
I don't wanna die so you're gonna have to_."

Luffy sang the chorus, frowning slightly due to the fact that this song had always made him remember him of memories that he did not want to remember.

"Words turn into blood and the blood keeps on pourin'  
From every pour I wipe it off 'cause this just could be the moment  
Now someone's gotta die and I'm my only opponent  
Cause I won't watch my baby cry so I keep on just goin'  
Am I a man or a beast it's mother nature at least  
Watch humanity cease cause it's our human disease  
You gotta kill when you gotta kill yeah that's what they say  
And I can't go against God's will you better pray  
Cause I'm an angel a demon yeah I'm hell and I'm heaven  
I'm everything you couldn't be now you believe in the devil  
I gotta Pick up the pieces I gotta bury them deep  
And when the dirt hits the coffin just go to sleep!"

Ace sang his lines with a dead tone, making the audience shiver slightly.

"_I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die  
I don't wanna die so you're gonna have to  
I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die  
No I don't wanna die so you're gonna have to  
Blood is getting hotter, body's getting colder  
I told you once I'm the only one who holds her  
I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die  
I don't wanna die so you're gonna have to_."

Luffy cut in again with the chorus before continuing with the next lines.

"_Now that I see...  
I see you buried  
Six feet Below~" _

Luffy sang eerily.

"**Another life goes into the night,  
I couldn't let 'em breathe 'cause I didn't wanna die.**"

Sabo added his own lines, letting himself be carried in the music.

"_Now that I see...  
I see you buried  
Six feet Below~" _

"**It's not alright can you hear me as i cry  
I couldn't let you live 'cause I didn't wanna die.**"

Sabo sang, his voice carrying across the deck as the.

"_I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die  
I don't wanna die so you're gonna have to  
I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die  
No I don't wanna die so you're gonna have to  
Blood is getting hotter, body's getting colder  
I told you once I'm the only one who holds her  
I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die  
I don't wanna die so you're gonna have to_~."

Luffy sang the first few lines of the final chorus, with the drums and the guitar cut off leaving only the keyboard as Luffy sang, voice echoing in the silence. Then the drums and the guitar came back in mid way, playing as Luffy sang the final lines and then cutting off seconds after he'd finished.

Luffy breathed out heavily – performing really took it out of him – but when he saw the ecstatic faces of his crew, it all seemed worth it, but they still had one more song to do, so he turned to his brothers and motioned that they carry straight on into the last song. They agreed.

"Right, our last song is called 'City!'" Ace yelled, all too willing to play his favourite song.

This time the drums were the first to start, quickly followed by the keyboard

"_Let's watch it burn  
Let's watch this city burn the world." _

Luffy sang, excitement lining his voice.

_**"Let's watch this city burn  
From the skylines on top of the world  
'Til there's nothing left of her  
Let's watch this city burn the world!"**_

All three brothers practically screamed the chorus, their melodies and beats not slipping an inch despite their excitement, clearly enjoying themselves. _**  
**_  
"My body doused in ash with two empty cans of gas  
The only evidence they have is a police sketch of my mask  
And it's hard at times to ask if you can save my heart for last  
And it's hard to face the facts when the darkness fades to black!"

Ace half sang, half shouted, grinning manically.

**"It's not just make believe when they make me take a seat  
And they put amphetamines in the air and make me breathe  
So come on and grab your children, look out for burning buildings  
And villains who pillage, they're killing by the millions  
And billions of people die for a lost cause  
So now I pray to my nation destroyed under god!"**

Sabo yelled, sharing his brother's enthusiasm and manic grin.

_"(It's the end of the world)  
All my battles have been won  
But the war has just begun!"_

Luffy cut in, his voice almost as loud as his brother's and his manic grin not nearly as creepy.

_**"Let's watch this city burn  
From the skylines on top of the world  
'Til there's nothing left of her  
Let's watch this city burn the world!"**_

All three brothers sang the chorus, their grins widening to impossible proportions.

"The city looks so pretty, do you wanna burn it with me?  
'Til the skies bleeds ashes and the fucking skyline crashes  
They catch us with matches to ignite the flame  
And all the hopes of a youth deemed fucking insane!"

Ace screamed, his voice seeming far too gleeful when he sang his lines about destruction.

"They say,  
**Take the pill**  
_In god we trust_  
**Go and kill**  
God loves us  
**As in life as in death  
**_**Breathing 'til there is no breath!"**_

All three brothers cut in with their lines, making it seem like there was only one person singing, before they sang the last line together, all screaming out the words as if it was the end of the world.

**"I will not die in the night but in the light  
Of the sun with the ashes of this world in my lungs  
But who am I to say let's all just run away  
Grab your saints and pray, we're gonna burn this world today!"**

Luffy's voice abruptly cut off as Ace and Sabo sung their lines, only to cut back in seconds later with his own lines.

"_(Say it's the end of the world)  
As in heaven as on earth  
We've been dead since our birth!"_

_**"Let's watch this city burn  
From the skylines on top of the world  
'Til there's nothing left of her  
Let's watch this city burn the world!"**_

Sabo and Ace joined in again for the chorus.

_"(Let's watch it burn) __[x2]"_

Luffy sang, seeming far too convincing.

"The city looks so pretty,  
Do you wanna burn it with me?  
The city looks so pretty  
Do you wanna burn it with me?  
The city looks so pretty  
Do you wanna burn it with me?"

Ace sang, an almost scarily wide grin on his face  
  
_**"We use the trees as torches!"**_  
"Do you wanna burn it with me?"  
_**"Fill the streets with corpses!"**_  
"Do you wanna burn it with me?"  
_**"Watch the city fucking bleed!"**_**  
**"Do you wanna burn it with me?"  
_**"Bring the world to its knees!"**_  
"Do you wanna burn it with me?"

Luffy and Sabo sang together, with Ace alternating and cutting in with his lines.

_**"Let's watch this city burn  
From the skylines on top of the world  
'Til there's nothing left of her  
Let's watch this city burn the world! **_ _**Let's watch this city burn  
From the skylines on top of the world  
'Til there's nothing left of her  
Let's watch this city burn the world!"**_

All three joined there voice once more to sing the last (double) chorus.

**"Let's watch it burn  
Let's watch it burn**."

Ace and Sabo chorused.

"_Let's watch this city burn the world!"_

Luffy sang the final line, words echoing across the silent deck as the music faded out.

The rest of the Mugiwara crew sat in stunned silence for several seconds before bursting out in an outcry of cheering and applause.

The ASL brothers – as their band was so cleverly called – put down their instruments and met in the middle to take a bow, linking hands (with Luffy in the middle and Ace and Sabo on either side) and smiling crazily.

They really really enjoyed themselves – especially with the last song, which was, coincidently, their most popular – chatting amiably with the rest of the crew as they packed away all of the instruments and helped Brook and Franky take them back to the storage room.

Nami and Robin shared a secret smirk; although they couldn't record what they had heard, Ace and Sabo had said nothing about telling anyone else about it, and boy were they going to brag when they next had a get together with the rest of the Supernovas and their crews. They were going to be so jealous!

**END**

**A/N: Yeah yeah, I know it's weird, but it's been bothering me for a while and I just had to get it out of my head. In case you couldn't follow:**

Ace's singing 

**Sabo's singing**

_Luffy's singing_

_**All three**_

**K? Ah well even if you aren't, I still wouldn't change anything about this chapter...unless i had a mistake, in which case then of course I would fix it! Who do you take me for?! **

**BTW, the songs that I used all belong to Hollywood Undead and I do not claim any of these as my own. **

**The first was 'Young.' And can be found if you type this One Piece AMV Young {Hollywood Undead} into youtube.**

**The second was 'I don't wanna die.' And can also be found if you type this One Piece amv Zoro I don't wanna die (Hollywood Undead) into youtube. **

**The third and last was 'City.' I named the fic after this because it was my favourite out of all three songs. This can be found if you type One Piece City! into youtube. **

**Okay so read and review please and I will try and get the next chappie up soon. **

**Tenebrae **


	17. Present

**A/N: The first thing that I would like to announce is that someone won my little competition based on the true identity of 'Des.' So I would first like to congratulate **_**I Love the Enigma **_**for their correct answer as to the identity of 'Des', I can now announce that 'Des' was in fact the God of the Underworld Hades (Ha****des****), his roman name is Pluto (I know that scientifically it is not classed as a planet per say, but if I'd said that they it would've given too much away), he is the God of the dead and wealth (greed is a sin and that could also be classed as an aspect of Hades) and he could probably bring people back from the dead if he wanted to. So congratulations to **_**I Love the Enigma, **_**this ficlet is your present and I wrote it especially for you as your prize. If I could make it exclusive then I would, but I have not been on this site for very long and I have no idea if that is possible and if so how I would go about doing that…so enjoy – if you don't like it then I am very sorry! +o+ **

**Present**

Nami was ecstatic, practically leaping around the deck of the Thousand Sunny, grinning and giggling as she bounced from the huge box to Robin to Sanji to Franky to Chopper to Usopp to Zoro to Ace and then back to the big box – her big box – and the same big box that had been given to her by Robin for her joining the-crew-anniversary. She really really really wanted to open it, but she also wanted the whole crew to be there as well – it was her special day after all, and she was the one who got to make the decisions today, captain's orders be damned – but Luffy wasn't here…in fact, she hadn't seen Luffy all day…

"Guys?" She asked, halting in her bouncing and turning to face the rest of the crew (and Ace, who had been in the area, then run in to Luffy and promptly dragged to the Sunny to celebrate with them), "Have any of you actually seen Luffy today?"

From the worried faces that greeted her question, she guessed not…well worried faces bar _one_.

"Robin…" Nami started, turning to face her fellow female crew member, "What did you do to Luffy?"

Her question was met by a large spurt of flame – courtesy of Ace – and the loud _shink _of swords being drawn – courtesy of Zoro. Whereas Robin merely chuckled and motioned to the large pink box that was innocently sitting on deck…the large pink box…the large pink box that could easily hold more than one person…the large pink box that could easily hold more than one person, that Robin had given her around the time that Luffy had disappeared…

Well, Nami was far from stupid, neither were Sanji, Zoro, Ace and Usopp, who all stared at the pink box with a mixture of suspicion and curiosity. Nami merely looked at it with greedy eyes – she and Robin had had a long talk about what she wanted for her anniversary-of-joining-the-crew present – and needless to say that, seeing as Robin knew many of the fantasies that she had of seeing her captain in various erm…positions with other…pirates, she _really_ wanted to open that box.

So she did. Undoing the neon pink ribbon bow on the top and gingerly pulling off the lid to peer inside.

Then promptly backed away from the box, a tomato red blush across her face. This – unfortunately for the 'present' – allowed the rest of the crew and Ace to approach the box and take a look inside themselves. Their reactions were varied; Usopp, Chopper, Franky and Sanji promptly burst out into hysterics while Zoro and Ace got lots of tick marks on their foreheads.

For there, sitting not so innocently in the large pink box, was Luffy, but he was not alone – oh no – Nami's ahem 'fantasies' were not that innocent. For there in the box, with the Mugiwara captain, sat Eustass Kidd and Trafalgar Law – thankfully Robin did not go too far in the makings of the present because they were all clothed, well they were all shirtless, but they were wearing pants at least – but, unfortunately for them, they could not escape the embarrassment of their current situation due to the fact that they were tied up.

Yes you heard me. Three big shot rookies, with a collective bounty of 815 million bellis, had been captured and then tied up by a woman who had a bounty worth barely a tenth of the collective sum of theirs.

And – to make matters worse – they were tied up with pink ribbons and were in a mildly suggestive position; Kidd was on the bottom, sitting up with Law on his lap, and Luffy on Law's lap; Luffy and Law had their legs wrapped around Law and Kidd's waist respectively, then their ankles were tied in place by a length of pink ribbon; Kidd had one of his hands wrapped around Luffy's waist and his other was linked with Law's, his hands were – again – tied in place by ribbons; Law's other hand was also wrapped around Luffy's waist, also tied in place by more ribbons; Luffy's arms were draped on Law's shoulders and tied behind the doctor's neck using, yes you guessed it, _more_ ribbons; finally Luffy's head was resting on Kidd's shoulder – the ribbon loosely tied around their necks keeping him in place – and Law's head was held to Luffy's bare chest, the ribbons around his neck threatening to choke him if he moved his head more than an inch from the rubber man's chest; all three of them were not amused and were supporting large scowls, glaring at the archaeologist with unsuppressed fury.

Luffy made an attempt to demand that someone would stop staring and get them out of this situation, but all that came out of his mouth when he tried was a harsh croaking sound, this was quickly following by some painful sounding coughing that prompted Law – since he was the only one who could reach – to give the Mugiwara captain a few gentle pats on the back.

"What's wrong with him?" Ace asked worriedly, but with an underlying threat in his voice promising pain if he found out that one of the other 2 Supernovas were responsible for Luffy's inability to speak.

"Talked himself hoarse." Kidd replied gruffly.

"What? How?" Nami asked, having never thought that their captain could lose his voice from _talking, _considering how much he yammered on a daily basis.

"That's usually what happens when you talk for around 3-4 hours straight…without water I might add." Law deadpanned.

"3-4 hours straight?! Why?!" Ace cried, now very worried.

"Well considering that we've been in here since mid-morning and it's now mid-afternoon and Mugiwara-ya did most of the talking for most of that time – obviously to keep us entertained – well then his throat is bound to be sore; he's also gonna need some water, we all are, it was very hot and stuffy in that box and dehydration is fairly possible at this point." Law explained, still gently patting Luffy's back while said rubber teen tried to calm his coughing fit, "Now could someone please untie us, I think this whole 'present' idea has gone far enough…Oh and make sure that you don't use devil fruit powers on these things," He continued, motioning to the pink monstrosities tying the trio together, "I have no idea what that woman did to these things, but they somehow negate devil fruit abilities, but they don't seem to weaken us like sea stone does." Law frowned, not liking the fact that he was completely at the mercy of a very powerful (not that he'll ever admit it) crew.

"It's very annoying, so get us outta this box and get the goddamn ribbons off!" Kidd snapped, a furious snarl contorting his face.

Luffy simply nodded along as his fellow Supernovas demanded – a rather small demand in his mind – that they be freed right now, and that they could also have some (read 'a lot') of water to cope with the possible dehydration that they had suffered from being in this infernal box for hours on end. Luffy never thought that he would say – or rather think – this, but Robin was an idiot; she had left them in a hot, stuffy box for hours , in a summer weather-pocket-thing and she hadn't even thought to give them any water! As much as he completely and utterly adored all of his crew members, he had to admit that his archaeologist had made a big mistake in choosing Nami's present, especially when said present was alive and not very happy at being confined; they'd be lucky if Kidd and Law didn't gut (or attempt to otherwise harm) the raven for her 'thoughtful' present.

While Luffy was in mental monologue mode, Zoro had made his way over to the box and had started slicing away the ribbons, starting with the ones on his captain and gradually moving onto those that were restraining the other two captains.

As soon as the trio were free, they immediately rushed out of the box and made a startlingly fast dash for the kitchen, all the crew managed to see were a trio of blurs and the kitchen door swinging closed seconds later. The first to go and investigate was Sanji – who did not want the three captains messing up his kitchen – but the rest of the crew wasn't far behind. Ace, Zoro and Sanji all entered the kitchen almost simultaneously and were greeted by the sight of 2 brunettes and a red head gulping down water as fast as they could get it out of the tap and into their respective cups.

Ace and Zoro were at Luffy's side in an instant, coaxing him to slow down before he made himself sick or worse, before gently guiding the shaky brunette onto the kitchen's plush green couch, nodding to Sanji as they did in a clear sign that he should whip something up for the obviously famished captains. Kidd and Law noticed their efforts and also slowed down their frantic thirst for water – Law having forgotten that too much water was bad, all due to the fact that he'd been in that box for any amount of time between 5 and 8 hours – and then following the smallest captain's example by flopping onto the couch with a loud sigh.

"If I ever have to see another box again, it will be too soon." Luffy groaned, stretching languidly across the couch.

"Agreed." Kidd and Law grunted.

"I hate surprise presents." Kidd added as an afterthought.

"Agreed." Luffy and Law said, nodding.

"Let's play poker." Law said, rising from his seat on the couch and striding towards the door.

"Agreed." Kidd and Luffy replied cheerfully, following Law out of the kitchen.

"Do you think we should…" Sanji started.

"No." Zoro and Ace deadpanned.

"But what if they…"

"Just…No."

"Your funeral." Sanji shrugged.

"You've got that right." Zoro muttered.

"Luffy playing poker, it gives me nightmare just thinking about it." Ace agreed.

"They're gonna kill us afterwards." Zoro put in.

"Yes. Yes they are." Ace nodded solemnly.

"What are you talking about?" Sanji demanded, annoyed at not being able to follow the conversation.

"Luffy's insane luck plus poker equals…" Zoro prompted.

"Oh shit no." Sanji swore, letting his head fall into his hands.

"Yeah. But you've got it lucky. I've had to deal with this for years." Ace moaned.

"How bad was it?" Zoro asked, feeling very sympathetic towards the elder D at that moment.

"He started when he was eight." Ace replied, shuddering at the memories prompted by that sentence.

"You poor poor soul." Zoro replied, patting Ace's shoulder sympathetically.

(Outside the kitchen door)

"What are they talking about in there?" Usopp asked, ear pressed against the wooden door.

"I dunno, but I bet you that it had something to do with Luffy." Chopper replied.

"Speaking of Luffy," Robin said, changing the subject, "How did you like your present Nami?"

"It was the best present ever! Thank you so much Robin!" Nami squealed, clutching pictures of her present to her chest.

"There's still your birthday, it's only a month away." Robin reminded her.

"YES!" Nami squealed, giving Robin a huge hug.

Meanwhile, Usopp, Franky and Chopper turned to each other and said,

"Oh hell no!"

**END**

**A/N: The end, yay! Read and review please. And please tell me if you liked it **_**I Love the Enigma**_** !**

**Ciao for now!**

**Tenebrae **


	18. Cuffs

**A/N: I dedicate this fic to the runner up of my little competition, mrsfirefist, who was so close yet so far at the same time. This is more of a weird omake than a fic but I hope you like it all the same. **

**Cuffs**

Luffy nearly carried Ace out of Impel Down; he and Iva couldn't find the key to Ace's cuffs and they had to leave before they were found, so Luffy had simply thrown his brother over his shoulder, freed and recruited Jimbe for the rescue Ace cause, and had taken off running. Ace hadn't been very happy with this arrangement, but had shut up when they came up on the first few patrols searching for escaped prisoners. This was until Inazuma had a random idea and attempted to cut through the chain connecting Ace's cuffs. This was when all of the escapees learnt that marines were cheap bastards, who only used the expensive sea stone to make the actual cuffs and that the chain connecting them was made out of really strong _non-sea stone_ metal. One snip was all it took and the middle link in the chain fell away and Ace could fight again; he couldn't use his fire powers but his hand to hand combat prowess hadn't diminished in the least, due to the fact that he always sparred with Marco, and had to forgo his flame powers when fighting with the damn phoenix.

From there the battle turned; Ace managed to 'acquire' a long metal spear and, together with his little brother and the rest of the escapees, slowly carved an escape route up to level one. This was all well and good, until they came to the exit of the prison – having finally managed to trap Magdellan in a random sea stone cage – and saw that they were completely surrounded by warships.

"Yosh!" Luffy yelled, throwing his arms into the sky, "Let's steal a ship and get outta here!"

"Idiot!" Ace replied, "We can't just steal a warship! It's not that easy!"

"I managed to break into Impel Down! That's not easy either!" Luffy retorted.

Ace blinked, he had a point, but it wasn't going to be easy at all…and since when could Luffy win an argument against him?!

"Well. . . When you put it that way, it is possible." Iva conceded.

"Yosh!" Luffy yelled again, "Let's get us a warship!"

"Right!" The rest of the escapees yelled, even if some were a bit unenthusiastic about the situation cough ACE cough.

In the end it took over 40 minutes, with the combined efforts of _all_ of the escapees, to capture and take over one of the warships. It then took them another hour and a quarter to open the gates and escape from the warship filled waters surrounding the prison. They then spent another tense hour sailing away from chasing warships as fast as they could and picking them off from a distance, well Luffy did anyway – there are advantages to being rubber after all –, the rest of the escapees just concentrated on getting away.

As soon as the last pursuing warship dipped over the horizon, the escapees allowed themselves to finally relax. Ace also chose this point to have a narcoleptic fit, much to the surprise of the rest of the escapees, excluding Luffy who had already shot forwards to catch his older brother before he hit the deck. Unfortunately Luffy underestimated both his own stamina (and injuries) and Ace's weight, and the combination of both of them sent both of them crashing onto the deck with a loud THUMP.

Luffy just laughed, even as his head smacked against the wooden deck – not that he noticed, being made of rubber and all – and casually ignored the winces of the rest of the escapees as he cuddled his big brother into his chest with a huge shit eating grin on his face. Ace merely grumbled at the fall and turned onto his stomach to use his little brother as a rubbery mattress, wrapping his arms around Luffy's chest and burying his face into Luffy's neck before drifting back to sleep seconds later.

Luffy then turned to the rest of the escapees, who were _still_ watching the brothers interact – trying to connect these brothers and their scary battle induced counterparts –, and chirped out in his happy-go-lucky tone,

"Anyone know how to pick locks?"

The escapees just stared at him.

"Oh, and could someone get a blanket for Ace?" He added after a few moments.

Stare.

"Um…guys?"

_Stare. _

"Guys!?"

_STARE. _

"GUYS!" Luffy yelled, covering Ace's ears at the same time so not to wake up the sleeping flame user.

The rest of the escapees finally snapped out of it, although Iva, Crocodile, Bon, Buggy, Jimbe and Inazuma were just playing along to get a reaction out of the small straw hat captain.

Iva finally decided to answer Luffy's questions before the kid got any louder and destroyed their ear drums, "Mugiwara-boya we can get you a blanket for your brother, but none of us can pick locks or we would've escaped earlier."

"Hmm, okay can you get a blanket then; the cuffs are okay for now." Luffy frowned slightly, but it disappeared as soon as a thick and soft blanket was presented to him by one of the many pirates that he had broken out of prison on his way to and from level 6.

Luffy took the blanket, chirping out a quiet 'thanks' to the pirate, and wrapped it around his brother and himself, smiling as Ace let out a contented sigh and nuzzled his thin rubber neck. Luffy responded by absently running his fingers through his brother's hair as he pondered the complex problem of 'how to get those stupid cuffs off of his big brother', Ace meanwhile was (unconsciously) enjoying every minute of his little brother's ministrations. This was very obvious to the rest of the escapees, as the feared Fire Fist Ace practically _purred_ in his little brother's arms.

Suddenly a light bulb flickered on inside of Luffy's head, he knew exactly how to get those annoying cuffs off Ace, and it was feasible…probably…maybe…well he knew that they could do it, the rest of the crew/escapees however…

"You want us to _what?!_" Crocodile exclaimed, pilfered cigar almost slipping out of his mouth.

"I want to go to Marineford." Luffy stated, still petting Ace's head like it was the most important thing in the world.

"Why the hell would you want to go there?!" One of the unnamed escapees yelled incredulously.

"Because," Luffy started, ready to explain the reason behind his obvious (in the rest of the escapees' minds) madness, "Seeing as the Marines have had Ace's execution planned for ages, and probably would not have planned for me being able to break him out of prison, then everyone will already be at Marineford, ready for battle. Now seeing as Hancock – she helped me get into the prison in the first place – mentioned that the Shichibukai and Admirals would be given the keys for Ace's cuffs for safe keeping, I reckon that we can go to Marineford, meet up with Hancock and get the key to Ace's cuffs. We also have to get Ace back to his crew, who will also be at Marineford, so it sounds like the best plan of action that we have right now. We could also get really close to Marineford, but not within cannon range, and signal the Whitebeard armada and Hancock to come to us. Besides, we need to get that key off Hancock and we need to get Ace to his crew, these are the easiest ways to do both." Luffy explained, much to the shock of the rest of the escapees and the newly woken Ace.

"Lu…" Ace looked up at his little brother in bewilderment, with a slight dose of fear and worry mixed in.

"Yeah?" Luffy looked down, slightly confused at Ace's expression.

"Are you sick or hurt or anything?" Ace asked, pressing one hand against his little brother's forehead.

"I don't think so…although Iva said something about the after effects of poison earlier." Luffy muttered.

"Poison?!" Ace yelled, head snapping to face the revolutionary so fast that you could hear it crack – much wincing occurred at this point, although Ace did not appear perturbed.

"It wasn't serious," Iva hastily explained when Ace directed his best death-glare towards him, "I've already given him the antidote to the poison. But a lot of sleep and some good food would not hurt." He finished.

"You heard the man." Ace told his little brother seriously, before flipping their positions so that Luffy was lying on his chest and then re-wrapping the soft blanket around them both, "Now got to sleep little bro." He whispered, pulling his little brother into his chest and slowly rocking them both until he heard Luffy's breathing even and he fell asleep.

Ace sighed, absently running his fingers through his hair before he fixed his eyes on Iva once more, pinning the revolutionary with his gaze, "Now tell me the truth, how bad was it?" He asked, his tone almost _daring_ Iva to lie to him again.

"If he hadn't got treatment when he did…then he would've died." Iva told him, "In fact, you have Bon-chan here to thank, he was the one who actually brought Mugiwara-boya to me in the first place. If it wasn't for him then your brother wouldn't be here right now." Iva said, gesturing to Bon who was standing next to him.

"Thank you." Ace said turned to the smaller okama, smiling warmly before bowing his head – he would've done a full bow, but Luffy was currently sleeping on him after all.

"So…" Ace smirked, "How long will it take us to get to Marineford?"

"You're not seriously thinking of going along with Mugiwara's plan are you?" Crocodile asked incredulously.

"Yes." Ace deadpanned.

"Why?" Buggy asked.

"Because, honestly, that was the smartest thing Luffy's ever said. The fact that it was a battle-plan (or something like one) means that he has thought about this – probably for a considerable amount of time – and that this, in fact, is one of the best solutions to the problem of how to get me back to my crew and how to get these damn cuffs off at the same time." Ace told them, staring down fondly at the sleeping brunette in his arms.

"Huh?" Inazuma nodded appreciatively, "In that case it will take us a few hours at least, but it's not as if they can start anyway, seeing as they haven't got the executee in the first place."

"Ah well, I'd much rather be here than there anyway." Ace joked.

"Who wouldn't?" Buggy muttered under his breath.

"So, since we've got some time anyway, I'm gonna take a nap." Ace continued, not hearing the clown's comment, yawning as he lay back down, curling around his little brother and quickly falling into a deep sleep.

"Mmm~ warm." Luffy mumbled, wrapping his arms around his brother's shoulders and nuzzling into Ace's neck before returning to the realm of Morpheus.

Bon, Buggy, Crocodile, Inazuma, Iva and Jimbe all sighed – simultaneously – before heading below deck to prepare for their 'trip' to Marineford. At the same time they marvelled at the D brothers' seemingly effortless ability to fall asleep anywhere and no matter the situation; at the same time they envied the carefree duo – they wanted sleep too damn it!

**END**

**A/N: Yea~ this is well shorter than most of my fics but I think that I ended at a good place. I will probably write a sequel to this at some point but I have no idea when. Please read and review~**

**Tenebrae**


	19. Clouds

**A/N: Something random I came up with on a 'business' activity day in school. **

**Clouds**

He lay there, warm, cosy; sitting on the cloudy white material, surrounded by blue. It was all around him, in all different shades; light, dark, azure, navy, sky, sea, pastel, acrylic. The many hues of the sky and sea blended around him, mixing and melding until he could no longer tell where the sea ended and the sky began. It was mesmerizing; the only thing preventing him from believing the whole world to be blue was the occasional white cloud drifting across the sky before gently dipping below the horizon, lost from his view, maybe forever.

The wind blew his hair, lifting it up and away from his head; caressing it and ruffling it into a dark halo around his head, contrasting with the soft, white material that he was lying on. The gentle breeze lifted his spirits like his hair, making him feel so at peace, like everything was still; silent; the only noises he could hear was the soft crackling of the waves and the sound of the wind hitting the sails and swirling around the ship.

He took a deep breath and sighed, a small smile gracing his face and blossoming across his boy-ish features, whisking away the dark shadows under is eyes and his haunted look. His eyes slid closed as he relaxed and allowed himself to just breathe in the salty yet refreshing sea air. The tension in his muscles slowly vanished as he took the time to just breathe in and out and drift away from all of life's trouble and relax.

His eyes were still closed when he felt eight pairs of arms curl around him, and eight warm bodies press against his own, pulling him to rest against shoulders, arms, chests, fur, slightly uncomfortable bones, cool metal, firm muscles and soft skin.

He smiled again, sinking into their familiar embrace, letting their nostalgic and soothing voices carry him away, letting their soft yet firm touch wash away all of his previous fears and worries, leaving him at peace…sweet peace, and he was content to just lay there with them until the sun died in the sky, the oceans froze over and the world was dragged into eternal sleep.

Out of the eight there were two that stood out; as they pulled him flush against their bodies, carding their fingers through his hair and calming him with their reassuring scents of tobacco and sake. The other six barely touched him compared to these two, they pressed and moulded against him, their hands slipping into his own, interlocking in his hair and looping around his waist…and he let them, encouraged them even. He felt their smiles on his skin, and heard the amused chuckles of the other six as they watched the three of them interacting together…to just be here with them all, he mused…it was nice.

And then another came, wrapping their hands around him and lifting him free of the other two that had been holding him moments before. The new one smelled of fire and spice, they were so warm and they felt safe and secure as their large hands cradled him against a warm and muscled chest, He was held like a child and cradled like he was made of glass, as long fingers combed through his hair and an even warmer head rested against his shoulder, nuzzling the rubbery skin and tickling his neck with wavy black hair. His legs wrapped round their toned waist, his arms curled round their warm neck and his hands fisted into the soft black hair, pressing their head further into his shoulder.

He wasn't sure how long they stood there together, wrapped around each other and simply enjoying the other's presence, but after a while he was passed off to another; this one smelt of freedom and power (if someone could smell like that), with the underlying scent of straw. He could feel one hand holding him but the other was nowhere, he couldn't feel it, and when he lifted his hand to find it, his fingers were met with the rounded and scarred stump of the missing arm.

He felt slightly guilty, as his fingers brushed over the silky material partly covering their scarred shoulder, but he didn't like to dwell on the past – he knew that it would be his down fall if he did – so, instead, he focussed on the present, occupying himself by wrapping his arms and legs around their waist and neck, hanging onto them like the monkey he was. He felt a surge of warmth hit him when the fire and spice one hugged him from behind, crushing him between the two powerful presences. He felt , in that long moment where the three just stood and basked in the warmth created between them, that his family was the best…they made him feel so safe…secure…and, best of all, loved.

XXX

"Is he okay?" Nami asked, watching the two brothers and Shanks interact.

"Why?" Zoro asked, a little worried that the sea-witch had seen something that he hadn't.

"He's being so…" Nami tried to explain, not being able to find the word to describe her thoughts.

"Submissive?" Robin suggested.

"Yes," Nami sighed in relief at being able to voice her question, "He's being so submissive to Ace and Shanks, why is that? He's not usually like that around anyone?"

"It's because of Shanks." Sanji stated, naturally being able to connect to Luffy's feelings due to his similar situation with Zeff.

"Shanks?" Nami asked, not seeing why the infamous pirate would make her captain act that way.

"Is it because Shanks saved him?" Usopp asked curiously.

"Or because Ace is here with Shanks?" Chopper suggested.

"No." Sanji deadpanned, "That's not it."

"Is it because Shanks and Ace are so super!" Franky shouted, more for the fun of saying the word 'super' than to answer Nami's question.

"Is it because they haven't seen each other in a long time?" Brook suggested.

"No, that's not it either." Zoro said, beating Sanji to the punch, having already known the answer due to his 'multi-purpose Luffy translator' ability.

"Then what is it?!" Nami snapped, frustrated at not knowing what was making her usually outgoing captain be so sedated.

"It's because they're family." Sanji and Zoro replied, "Shanks is the father and Ace is the big brother, and – in Luffy's mind – that's what matters."

"So...why's he being submissive?" Nami asked, still not getting it.

Zoro and Sanji sighed, before tuning and walking away; if she didn't get it now, then there was no point trying to explain further. Luffy was acting the way he was because he was with his family, he was relaxing and basking in their loving hold. In fact, to say that their capatin was being submissive would be a lie, he was simply letting his surrogate father and brother hold him and love him. If Nami didn't get that, then this conversation was a lost cause.

Luffy was Luffy, right now he was still Luffy, when he was outgoing he was still Luffy, they knew that, they didn't try to explain that. Luffy was Luffy, and that would never change.

**End **

**A/N: whoa this was sappy, and fluffy…it was very different. Well I hope you enjoyed this mini-chappie. Don't worry though; a longer one will be out sometime this week. Review please! **

**Tenebrae **


	20. Two

**V READ THIS OR YOU WON'T UNDERSTAND THE STORY! V**

**A/N: Sorry for taking so long to update, seriously, be appeased with this story! Another Marineford fic – I love them soo~ much it's ridiculous – this one is very different from any of my previous ones…except one, maybe, possibly, kinda, well it depends on your opinion but I really do think that they are pretty different. I'm rambling. Sigh, just read the fic and tell me what ya think okiday? Now this is very AU because in this fic the Marineford battle – the war of the best – is after the 2 year gap. The logistics of this are that Luffy and his crew got separated in Shabondy (following cannon) and, due to this, Luffy felt that they all needed extra training time, so they split for two years. Then, 2 weeks before they are supposed to meet up again, Luffy hears of his brother's execution – Ace and Blackbeard just missed each other at Banaro Island, so their fight was delayed for two years due to certain events that led them away from each other. So Ace was captured 2 years later than in cannon, then Luffy hears about it and decides to rescue him, he then goes to Impel Down – avoids getting poisoned by Magellan – and misses Ace by less than a minute, he then frees as many inmates as he can and then takes them with him and heads straight for Marineford. Then….well, you'll just have to read and find out, wont you? **

**Two**

Edward Newgate – AKA Whitebeard – surveyed the scene that was currently taking place from the deck of the Moby Dick, and sighed. The last few hours had been hectic to say the least, but ever since the little enigma called Monkey D Luffy had arrived, the chaos of battle had seemed to become more pronounced. Nothing was as it seemed with the little rookie; after he and his crew had disappeared 2 years ago Ace had been distraught, searching far and wide for the illusive Straw Hat crew and finding no signs of any of their members anywhere on the Grand Line. Then Ace had been captured – by the traitor no less – and this whole pre-planned execution had been brought to light. Needless to say, Whitebeard had responded by practically declaring war on the foolish Marines that were trying to kill one of his sons. And the battle had started a while ago, but Whitebeard had quickly seen that the battle would be a stalemate unless he or Sengoku pulled out some big game changers soon. But that was where the little enigma had come in, falling from the sky with over 100 escapees from Impel Down and bringing with him several well known faces. The kid was ballsy to say the least – breaking into Impel Down and then breaking out again was no simple feat, then charging headfirst into a battle was even more so. So Whitebeard had decided to bet on the kid, ordering his forces to back the little rookie, and it was a good thing that he did; the marines would never believe what the ballsy rookie did next…

**000**

Luffy was falling. He could see Iva and Crocy and Bon-chan and Buggy and Inazuma and Jimbe and all of the other escapees falling around him too. They were all falling towards the ice, or rather a hole in the ice…the _only_ hole in the ice that was covering the bay around Marineford. Luffy had a comic WTF look plastered across his face as he got closer and closer to the water, his last thoughts before he, the stolen warship and the other escapees hit the water was that he hoped that Jimbe saved him because he still had to rescue Ace and become Pirate King and that failing right now was unacceptable because it was a really lame way to die.

**SPLASH**

The warship hit the water, along with all of the pirates she had been carrying and the echoing sound of her fall echoed across the – now silent – battlefield, as all of the fighters stopped and stared at the not-quite-sinking battleship that had just fallen from the sky.

Meanwhile, Jimbe had dragged all of the devil-fruit users out of the water and had thrown them unceremoniously onto the deck, muttering about annoying hammers as he did, before returning to the water to drag out more of the escapees that couldn't swim or were just uncannily bad at it. This gave the devil-fruit users some time to collect themselves before they had to do battle, so Luffy decided to use this time wisely and spent the next few minutes hacking up water and trying to figure out what the best way to rescue Ace was. After a few minutes of hard thinking, he decided to go with the flow and just make up a plan as he goes along.

Nodding to himself, he turned his attention back to the rest of the escapees, who had assembled themselves on the deck while he had been thinking, Jimbe had also returned from his search for drowning pirates and all of his temporary rag-tag rescue-Ace-crew were now staring at him and waiting for some sort of order…well all except one.

"Where's Crocy?" Luffy asked, looking around the half sunken deck in confusion.

"I believe that the sandy dot over there is him." One of the escapees piped up, pointing to a brownish dot that was soaring away from them.

"You mean the sandy dot that is heading for Ace's Ossan-captain's ship." Luffy asked, for confirmation.

"Yes that sandy dot." The same random escapee confirmed.

"Well, I better go kick his ass then. Ace likes that Ossan. I'll be back in a bit." Luffy half growled half chirped, making him sound slightly insane, before throwing out an arm and launching into Gear Second before springing off the deck of the stolen warship, leaving only a spiral of smoke/steam in the place that he had previously been standing.

The use Gear Second ensured that Luffy reached his target just as the sand-man was raising his gold hook – when had he fixed that? – to slash at the back of the giant Yonkou. Luffy easily deflected the gold hook with one sandaled foot, while his other foot came up and sent the ex-Shichibukai flying across the deck. Luffy, meanwhile, landed gracefully and stood up, back to back with the man that Ace had told him so much about, the same man that Ace had promised to make Pirate King, and the same man that was also trying his hardest to rescue his big brother.

"Monkey D Luffy." The giant man said, turning to face the small rookie, with a sliver of amusement in his tone.

"That's me. Oh, and we overheard some marines planning on pushing Ace's execution forward, there were a lot of stupid marine codes thrown in too but that was the only bit that made sense." Luffy replied, also turning to face the Yonkou, dead serious for once; he knew who this man was and frankly he didn't care, what he did care about was whether the man would help him get Ace, if this man tried to stop him then – damn the consequences – he would fight tooth and nail for his right to rescue his big brother, Ace was his before he was Whitebeard's, he had more right than the Ossan did.

"Ace was worried about you. When you and your crew went missing for the last 2 years, he searched the whole of Paradise looking for you, right until he was captured." Whitebeard said, his amused tone crumpling under his almost palatable anger at one of his sons' capture.

Luffy's eyes dropped to the floor, he had never meant for Ace to get worried, he was only doing what he thought was best for the crew. He knew that they had to get stronger – their battle against Kuma had shown them that – and their separation had provided the means for them to get stronger. He knew that his crew would be able to improve with leaps and bounds where they were right now, so he'd contacted them – destroying a huge marine base and getting his message splayed across the papers, along with a significant bounty increase due to the destruction; marines were so picky, you kill a few of their men and they didn't care, you destroy one of their bases and barely injure any marines at the same time and they label you a psychopath – and then he'd trained, Rayleigh had been a very good teacher, and he'd gotten a lot stronger. He'd never meant for Ace to get captured because of his decision…so he'd rescue his big brother and explain himself. Yes, he thought, that was the best way to do this.

"I'll explain once I've rescued him!" Luffy chirped enthusiastically, completely missing the looks of frank disbelief that he was getting from Whitebeard's commanders.

"You'll rescue him?" Whitebeard laughed, "This battle is too high level for you brat, you should just concentrate on getting back to your crew." He said, not at all noticing how the air had gotten heavier and that Luffy was looking down, fists clenched, with the shadow of his hat covering his eyes.

"'This battle is too high level for you…'" Luffy echoed, his voice almost dead; he was not going to let this Ossan tell him that, he'd spent 2 years busting his ass off training to get stronger, for himself and for his nakama, and now some guy – who had no idea what he'd been doing for the past 2 years – was telling him that he was weak and that he should turn his back on his brother when he was about to be executed?! This was unacceptable.

"Shut up…" Luffy growled, his voice barely audible, just managing to be heard over the cacophony of the battle raging beside them, "You don't know anything about what I've been doing for the last 2 years. All you know about me is 2 years out of date; you think that the me from 2 years ago was weak. I'm not the same as I was then, so don't think that you know me. I'm not weak. And I'm not about to turn my back on my brother when he's on an execution tower!" Luffy yelled, punctuating his sentences with Haki in his frustration.

"I know your game; you want to become Pirate King!" Luffy continued, not at all concerned that he was speaking to a man that could probably crush him with little effort, "But the one who's gonna be Pirate King is me! So don't ever call me weak!" Luffy yelled, his statement echoing across the battlefield and sending both marines and pirates into shock at his bold statement.

"Your ballsy brat, I'll give you that." Whitebeard chuckled a few moments later, once he had gotten over his initial shock at the brat's statement.

"I'll show you…" Luffy muttered petulantly, before yanking Crocodile out of the arms of the crew and springing off of the deck and back to his own (temporary) rag tag crew.

"Really? Well… He's interesting and I have a feeling that he's going to be a game-changer." Whitebeard muttered before turning to the commanders. "Marco, make sure that the kid doesn't die." Whitebeard said, prompting said first commander to groan; based on many of Ace's stories about the kid, this wasn't going to be an easy feat…nope, not in any sense of the word.

At the same time, with the so called (temporary) rag tag rescue Ace crew, Luffy was very annoyed and making that very clear by shouting at Crocodile. Surprisingly, it was a very effective stress reliever for the rubber teen, and, after a couple minutes of shouting, Luffy was much more relaxed and Crocodile was almost deaf. Good times.

"So, Mugiwara-boya, are you just gonna stand there or are you gonna rescue your brother?" Iva asked, snapping said Straw hat teen out of his thoughts.

Luffy replied by jumping onto the railing of the half sunken warship and bellowing out across the battlefield,

"AAAAACCCCEEEE!" He cried, bringing the attention of all of the fighters, marines and pirates alike, onto him.

At the same time, Ace's eyes lit up; he had been so scared when Luffy had disappeared 2 years ago, he had searched Paradise from top to bottom and had found no sign of Luffy anywhere. His crewmates had tried to console him and said that his little brother had just gone into hiding after he had hit a tenryuubito, but anyone who actually knew Luffy could tell that that was bullshit – Luffy would never willingly go into hiding, he wasn't the type, something drastic had to have happened for that to be the case, he hadn't heard of anything like that, so he had no idea why Luffy would have made the decision to hide (neither did his crewmates for that matter), so what his crewmates had been telling him was utter bull in his mind.

"I'M HERE TO RESCUE YOU! I'LL BE THERE SOON!" Luffy continued, unaware of his brother's thoughts.

"Okay let's go!" He finished before leaping off of the ship and towards the writhing mass of marines below them.

"Right!" His rag tag rescue crew yelled, following behind their (temporary) captain; they were all too eager for battle, after being locked up for so long, the thoughts of battle excited and enthralled them, filling them with adrenaline and pushing them to fight with their lives on the line.

Luffy and the rest of the escapees fell on the marine fighters like a plague; cutting through the marine ranks like a knife through butter, they quickly spread out to cover a larger area and split into smaller groups to tackle some of the stronger fighters. Crocodile, Iva, Inazuma and Jimbe all chose to stick with Luffy, some for personal reasons – Iva and Inazuma were _not_ about to let **Dragon's **_**son**_ go into a full scale war with the marines alone –,one because he liked Ace's little brother coughJimbecough and one because he figured that he would run into strong opponents if he stuck with the reckless teen coughCrocodilecough.

Well, in any case, one of them coughCrocodilecough was right; not 5 minutes after he had entered the battle, Luffy came face to face with Moria (again), Kuma (again) and Doflamingo. It was then that their little group split up, with Crocodile running off to face Doflamingo, Iva and Inazuma practically flinging themselves at Kuma for his apparent betrayal and Jimbe keeping Moria at bay. Unfortunately or fortunately depending on your opinion, Luffy's luck ensured that the next two (strong) people he faced were Hancock and Smoker. It was at that point when the whole world learned where Luffy had probably been for the past 2 years,

"LUFFY!" Hancock squealed as she ran at the rapidly paling teen, flying straight at him only to face plant as he neatly stepped out of the way.

"I'm not marrying you." Luffy deadpanned.

"But…" Hancock pouted up at him from her kneeling position where he had been standing seconds before.

"No…I still have to become Pirate King!" Luffy huffed, crossing his arms and staring at her with a stubborn look on his face.

"So…after you become Pirate King?" Hancock continued, looking up at him with hopeful eyes.

"…" Luffy said nothing…which Hancock apparently took as a 'yes' because her arms were soon wrapped around the rubber teen, squashing him against her rather large assets while squealing and jumping up and down on the spot.

At the same time, Smoker was trying not to throttle the only female Shichibukai; what the hell did she think she was doing, even if she did like the rubber brat, she was stealing his target…and she was switching sides…but _she_ was stealing _his_ target! Reining in his temper for the moment, Smoker used the opportunity presented by Luffy's non-answer to roughly poke Hancock in the side, causing her to lose all her strength for a few seconds, which gave him the perfect opportunity to snatch his s target out of her arms before he suffocated, rubber powers or not.

"Thanks." Luffy coughed from his position on the ground where Smoker had dropped him, "I thought I was going to die for a second there."

"No problem." Smoker grunted.

"Shall we continue our fight from 2 years ago." Luffy grinned, it wasn't a question.

"You're on." Smoker grinned back, slipping into a fighting stance.

They were just about to start what would have been a legendary battle when they were interrupted by an announcement from Sengoku,

"**Don't let this rookie control the war." **He thundered.

Luffy blinked, "What's he talking about, I've barely done anything yet." He muttered to Smoker, who was looking at the teen in astonishment – he called raiding Impel Down, letting loose over a hundred pirates with a bounty of 50mil or more and storming Marineford, 'barely doing anything'?!

"**He's a loose cannon, he was raised along with Ace as his adopted brother." **

"Where's he going with this?" Smoker muttered to the air.

"**He's actually the biological son of the Revolutionary Dragon!" **Sengoku yelled, finally getting to the point.

The stunned silence on the battlefield was broken by an innocent statement from an unlikely source,

"So that's why he saved you at Loguetown." Smoker muttered to the rubber teen still standing next to him.

"Yup. Although I didn't know he was my dad back then." Luffy replied, "Now, let's have that fight!" He yelled, settling back into a fighting stance.

"I couldn't agree more." Smoker smirked, also settling back into his fighting stance.

A few seconds passed before both fighters shot at each other, both wanting to get in the first hit. Unfortunately it was not to be, just as they were about to make contact, a long leg spun out of nowhere, hitting Smoker and sending him sprawling, said long leg belonged to none other than Boa Hancock.

"As much as I love seeing my darling so happy, he has to rescue his brother now." She said, smiling sweetly as she handed the key to Ace's cuffs over to the stunned teen with a wink before engaging with a furious marine whose target had been stolen _again_.

"Thanks Hancock!" Luffy yelled over his shoulder as he resumed his full out sprint towards the execution tower.

It was at this point that the marines decided that they were too good to stick to a schedule; Sengoku ordered for Ace to be executed immediately. At the same time Luffy was having a hard time keeping calm; they were going to execute Ace, _his _Ace, _his brother!_ Well, he wasn't about to let that happen, as soon as the executioners raised their swords, he let loose with a controlled spear of Haki, knocking out the two marines without a sound or even an inkling of his involvement.

If Sengoku was surprised at the show of the extremely rare King's Haki from an unknown source he did not show it, instead he ordered Garp to 'pop out' for a few minutes and get another two executioners. Garp nodded obediently, but inside he was wearing an diabolically evil smirk; Sengoku wouldn't be able to receive another two executioners before his grandson rescued his surrogate grandson, after all, it wasn't his fault if all of the executioners on the base were mysteriously unconscious when he found them, and if they had a lump roughly the size of his fist on their heads then that was sheer coincidence.

At the same time, another member of the Monkey family was making an important decision; Luffy was going to save his brother, in his mind there was no other option, it was either save Ace or die trying…that was the only reason he was even thinking about using _**That**_. Yes _**That**_ deserved to be capitalised, it was an option that he was told explicitly by both his crew, his gramps and Ace to never use in any circumstances unless – a big unless – he was in a situation where he was about to die and there was nothing anyone could do to stop it.

Well, Luffy rationalised, he was on a battlefield, with _all three_ admirals, and the _fleet admiral_, and _all_ of the Shichibukai, with _none_ of his crew present and his allies _all split up_ around the battlefield…if that wasn't a situation where he could die at any second then he would eat his shorts!

So he prepared himself, slowing his flat out sprit until he jogged to a stop, taking in a deep breath and then pulling a pair of tiny sheathed daggers out of the pocket of his short. Then, taking a deep breath once more; Monkey D Luffy prepared to astound the world.

No one realised what the crazy little rookie was doing when he started pricking his fingers and palm with the tiny twin daggers, or when he dropped the little blades and rubbed his hands together, spreading his blood across his hands, and when he crouched down and smacked his hands onto the concrete, creating two bloody hand prints on the rock, with his thumbs and index fingers touching to form a triangle. More importantly, no one tried to stop him. Not even when he completed his bloody pattern when he scrawled the numbers '3' to '11' into the gap within the triangle and stood up to admire his work. At this point, the world was convinced that Monkey D Luffy was insane, after all, who would storm Marineford to rescue his brother only to stop half was and make a weird drawing in his own blood?! Only one person realised what he was doing, and that person was adamant that he stop it right now before he hurt himself.

"**LUFFY!"** Ace yelled, shifting the worlds' attention off his little brother and onto the person that they were trying to execute, **"Don't you dare Luffy! Don't even think of doing what I think you're doing!" **He yelled, confusing a vast majority of the fighters present along with the rest of the watching population.

"**Sorry Ace! I'm gonna do it anyway!" **Luffy yelled back, serious for the moment.

"**Don't you dare! You know what could happen if you use **_**That**_**! Don't you dare use It!" **Ace screamed, desperation shining in his eyes.

"**When I said that I would save you, even if it kills me, I meant it! I'll save you, Ace, even if my life it forfeit!" **Luffy yelled back, stunning his brother into silence.

The world could only watch. None of the fighters moved, it was as if an invisible force was holding them in place. They could only watch as Luffy picked up his twin daggers again, smearing their blades with his blood as he did, before raising them high into the air.

"**Kōru Kōru no…"** He yelled, his voice cutting through the silence, as he plunged the daggers into the centre of the bloody handprints that he had made earlier, "**Yobidasu!" **

There was a pregnant pause for a few seconds when nothing happened; people were just about to start laughing when 8 pillars of coloured light (green, orange, yellow, purple, blue, grey, pink and brown) surrounded Luffy, hiding his form from view. Then the lights exploded outwards, forcing those watching to shield their eyes from the blinding flash, when the light flickered out and it was safe to look again the watchers could do nothing but stare at the impossible scene before them.

Because this scene was impossible…well outside of Sengoku's and Whitebeard's predictions…there was only one person (currently) on the battlefield who thought that this could happen, and at that moment all he was doing was praying to every deity out there for his little brother to be okay…but there was a good reason that this scene was not in any prediction…or even considered possible…because, at that moment, it wasn't just Monkey D Luffy crouching next to a weird pattern on the ground…it was Monkey D Luffy crouching next to a weird pattern on the ground, but he wasn't alone, he was now standing amongst 8 others, glaring at the world, 8 very infamous pirates in particular…

"Geez Luffy," Zoro sighed, "The first time you use this and you summon us into the middle of a war." He grumbled, not looking annoyed in the slightest, in fact he looked very _very_ excited.

"We really should have tested this thing beforehand." Nami grumbled.

"Yeah, I don't know about the rest of you guys, but I was pretty weirded out to be sucked up by a brown pillar of light that materialised out of nowhere." Usopp huffed.

"I thought it was quite interesting." Robin said, smiling eerily.

"We should definitely look into it later." Chopper agreed.

"It was Super!" Franky yelled, smashing his large forearms together.

"Yes it was Yohohoho!" Brook laughed.

"Thank you thank you thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou!" Sanji half cried as he hugged his captain, twirling the confused teen around in circles, "You saved me from that hell! You could have done it earlier! But thank you thank you thank you so much!"

"Let go of him!" Zoro growled, snatching Luffy out of the cook's grip and placing him gently on the ground. "Are you okay?" He asked softly, drawing the rest of the crew's attention – they wanted to know how Luffy was too!

"I'm okay…" Luffy murmured, swaying precariously on the spot before falling back into his first mate's arms.

"You're not okay." Zoro growled, "What's wrong?"

"Tired." Luffy grunted truthfully, "**Yobidasu **took a lot out of me."

"Well, that was expected." Robin muttered.

"OI! Love-cook! Get Luffy some food!" Zoro yelled, not hearing Robin's comment and fully focused on his captain.

"That's not my name Marimo!" Sanji yelled back, but he listened anyway – if this was for anyone else, he wouldn't think of listening to the marimo, but this was for Luffy, his captain, so he listened and obeyed…for now, "Here you go Luffy." Sanji continued in a smooth tone, presenting the large slab of meat that he had just retrieved from his pack to his captain.

"Thanks." Luffy chirped before his hand darted out, swiftly grabbing the large hunk of meat and practically swallowing it whole, within a matter of moments he was back at full strength and the meat had been reduced to a single pristine white bone.

"So, captain, why have you summoned us?" Robin asked, although she already knew the answer.

"We're-" Luffy started, still in Zoro's arms, but was cut off by a loud shout from 'the-reason-why-he-had-summoned-his-crew.'

"OI RORONOA!" Ace yelled, startling Sengoku with his loud and abrupt shout, "IS LUFFY ALRIGHT?!"

"YEAH! HE'S FINE!" Zoro yelled back.

"Thank god." Ace breathed, relief flooding through his body; Luffy was okay, Luffy was fine, he had not dragged his little brother to his death, Luffy was okay…

Ace's relieved thoughts were interrupted by Sengoku, who thought that this was a _perfect_ time to order a full out attack on the newly reunited Straw Hats…

"**Why are you just standing there?! Their captain is exhausted and there are only nine of them, we have numbers bordering the thousands! This is the perfect time to capture the Straw Hats once and for all!" **Sengoku thundered.

Nami sweat dropped, "Guys…?" She started, trailing off to allow the rest of the crew to respond.

"Yeah?" The remaining 8 pirates asked, all looking annoyed at Sengoku's speech.

"Is it me or does he hold a grudge against us? He seems to want our capture more than Whitebeard and his commanders'." Nami continued, voicing her thoughts.

"Well…we have given the government the most trouble it's had since Gol D Roger." Usopp deadpanned.

"We can't have been _that_ bad!" Nami protested.

"Yes, yes we were." Chopper stated, "And still are."

"We stormed Enies Lobby. It's still being rebuilt as we speak." Sanji reasoned.

"We've defeated a number of very powerful people, including warlords." Usopp butted in.

"I broke into Impel Down and then broke out again with over a hundred prisoners…all of which are worth 50mil or more." Luffy added, ignoring the gaping looks from the rest of his crew and the tightening his first mate's grip on his shoulders.

"And now Luffy's gone and stormed Marineford and then did the impossible and summoned us from across the world. If that's not troublesome for the government then what is?" Robin finished.

"We're super!" Franky yelled, clashing his huge forearms together.

"Yohohoho~!" Brook laughed.

"Okay, fine," Nami sighed and gave in, "He has a legitimate reason to hate us."

"Right, now that we've sorted that out…can we please deal with the marines that are sprinting at us, trying to capture or kill us?" Usopp complained.

"Yes, that would be a good idea, wouldn't it?" Robin nodded.

"A very good idea." Nami agreed, "Which is why only three of us will take care of the problem."

"Only three? Why?" Usopp asked, slightly confused.

"Well, just think about it, if three of us beat all of these marines that are charging us then it will show Sengoku not to underestimate us." Nami explained, "Oh, and Zoro, let go of Luffy. He's fine." She added, turning on the grouchy first mate.

"Fine." Zoro grunted, gently setting Luffy back onto his feet, but still keeping a close eye on his captain, just in case Luffy wasn't as 'fine' as he said he was.

"Right, now who wants to do this?" Nami asked, turning to the rest of the crew.

"We should have three who have big moves that can wipe out dozens very quickly." Robin reasoned.

"Me." Luffy chirped, throwing his hand up., "I've got something that could take out all of them!"

"Great, we'll just have Luffy then. Show Sengoku how 'exhausted' our captain is!" Usopp smirked.

"Whenever you're ready." Robin prompted.

Luffy didn't answer, striding towards the oncoming marines, practically oozing confidence. The marines laughed at him, thinking that he was surrendering because he knew that he couldn't beat them…boy were they wrong. It was over in a second, no more than a single second, that's how long it took for Monkey D Luffy to knock out 33,000 marines. In an instant they were all falling and he had his back to them, walking back to his smug crew, not a hint of exhaustion in his smooth stride, leaving the world gaping in his wake.

"How's that for tired?!" Luffy proclaimed, standing in the middle of his crew, practically daring the rest of the marines and Shichibukai to challenge them.

"Haoshoku Haki…." Sengoku breathed, "So he's the one who knocked out the executioners." He mumbled with dawning realisation.

"Luffy, you…you too." Ace muttered, with a strange gleam in his eyes.

"So he's had that, all this time…" Nami muttered.

"Well it's only fitting; if he wasn't powerful then he wouldn't be my Captain." Zoro grinned, still keeping a close eye on Luffy…just in case.

"Yeah." Sanji agreed, nodding slightly.

Nami blinked, had Sanji and Zoro just agreed on something? What kind of training had they been doing?! Taking etiquette lessons?!

"Right, everyone!" Luffy yelled, interrupting her thoughts, "I called you here to help me rescue Ace! I've already got the key to his cuffs! Let's go rescue him! Let's show the world the results of our training!" He yelled as he charged straight towards the execution tower.

"YOSH!" The infamous Mugiwara crew replied, following their Captain's dead sprint, charging straight into the thick of the battle.

It was downhill – for the marines – from there; even if there were only 9 of them, the Mugiwaras packed a punch, they fought with reckless abandon, pulling out stranger and stranger moves practically out of thin air, against such a foe, the marines were practically useless.

Luffy grinned, here he was, right in the thick of battle, right in the middle of a war, with his crew alongside him, cutting a straight path through the marines like a knife through butter. He was strong, his crew were strong, they had almost reached Ace, and he couldn't stop thinking of how his decision to use **Yobidasu** had been one of the best of his life.

Sengoku gaped at the battlefield; this wasn't in his predictions, never – not even in his wildest dreams – could he had thought of this happening; the Mugiwara crew were too strong, fact. They were sending out all sorts of impossible moves like it was nothing; Haki from the Captain himself, bladed tornadoes from the 'pirate hunter', 'Black-leg' was flying, the 'cyborg' was shooting missiles out of his shoulders, the supposedly weak 'candy-cotton-lover' was now a giant monstrous beast and was sweeping away countless marines with his arms, 'Sogeking' or someone like him was firing weird shots that turned into giant plants and ate people, 'the demon child' had materialised a huge pair of legs and was using them to crush dozens at a time, the 'cat-burglar' had somehow created a thunder cloud on the battlefield and was using it to literally shock the marines around her into submission, and last but not least 'dead bones' was using some sort of hypnosis to turn the marines on each other; all in all, it wasn't going well for the marines.

But that wasn't the end of it, oh no Sengoku thought, the Mugiwaras had now come across Akainu, and they appeared to be winning, no they were definitely winning, they were beating him to a pulp. The fact that he was both a logia user and consequently a lava man didn't seem to deter the aptly named 'Monster Trio' – monsters indeed – because none of them were having any problems punching/slicing/kicking the admiral into a bloody pulp, it seemed that all three of them were Haki users, decent ones at that, and Akainu was actually being toyed with by the three monsters as they passed him around like a human football.

Though thankfully for both Akainu's health and his pride, the monster trio had quickly gotten bored of their 'pass the admiral' game and were now heading straight for the execution tower, with the rest of the crew helping to carve a path through the seas of marines.

This couldn't continue, Sengoku thought, this had to end, it was a shame that he had to do this personally but Garp still hadn't returned with some new executioners and beggars can't be choosers after all.

He turned to his soon to be dead executionee, who was now smiling with pride for his little brother, and, missing the shocked and outraged looks from Luffy and his crew as they realised just _what_ he was about to do, Sengoku picked up the two blades from the executioner's limp grip, he took the time to have one last look at the pirate that he was going to kill – Portgas D Ace was now staring up at him with a shocked but defiant look – before aligning the blades over Portgas' neck, sending a glance towards Whitebeard as he did, then he lifted both blades into the air, pausing for effect before bringing them both down in a lethal arc.

That pause was his undoing.

As soon as they had seen him pick up the blades, the Mugiwaras had known what Sengoku was doing, and in the time that he took to glance at Whitebeard they had already come up with a plan and were well underway with implementing it. Luffy, Zoro and Sanji had sprinted forward at full speed, with Luffy quickly kicking into Gear Second to add on extra speed. They were barely 50m away from the tower when Sengoku raised the blades and paused, this pause gave the trio enough time to act on their plan, Luffy leapt into the air where Sanji and Zoro used a kick and the flat of all three swords respectively to propel their Captain forward, straight towards Sengoku. They landed moments later, eyes snapping to the execution tower, praying that they hadn't been too late.

Ace was hit with the force of a freight train as Luffy crashed into him, sending him flying out of harm's way; out of the corner of his eye, Ace watched in horror as the blades sliced instead into Luffy's shoulder blades, creating a large splatter of blood and practically gouging two lines of flesh right out of his brother's back. At the same time, Luffy's hands latched on to the sea stone cuffs, ramming the key in his hand straight into the lock and turning it sharply, producing a small click as the cuffs fell away, releasing the, now very _very_ pissed off pirate, Ace wasted no time in whirling to his feet and ramming a flaming fist straight into the stunned fleet admirals face, sending him staggering backwards and unable to do a thing as Ace scooped Luffy into his arms and leapt off the execution tower.

Ace, with Luffy still in his arms, landed safely on the ground to the loud cheers of his crew, but he paid them no mind, instead making a bee-line for Chopper, intent on getting Luffy seen to as soon as humanly possible. Sanji and Zoro soon joined him, exchanging worried looks at their Captain's condition before sprinting ahead to clear a path for Ace to run through. It took an agonising 5 minutes to clear a path to Chopper, who had seen his Captain's condition and had already gathered Robin, Nami, Usopp, Franky and Brook and had had them set up a perimeter around him and his medical supplies. He had already set up an emergency operating area and he had already put out all of the drugs and medical instruments that he thought he might need.

So when Ace, Sanji and Zoro got there, still carrying a bloodied and limp Luffy, Chopper was all ready to go, quickly snapping out orders for Sanji and Zoro to join the perimeter and for Ace to place Luffy face down on the large white sheet surrounded by medical supplies in the middle of the circle. Orders that all three men quickly followed, with Zoro and Sanji sprinting to fill in the gaps in the circle that the rest of the crew that made for them, while Ace hurriedly lay his little brother face down on the white sheet, before moving quickly out of the way as Chopper immediately took his half-human form and started to cut off Luffy's shirt, exposing the gaping wounds to the air.

Ace tried not to watch as Chopper started to wipe away all the excess blood from his brother's back, he simply held on to one of Luffy's hands, slowly massaging small circles in the rubbery skin as a silent show of concern and support, and he quickly looked away when Chopper picked up a scalpel and started to softly cut away any excess skin in the wounds. Every once in a while he felt Luffy's small hand squeeze his own, signifying that his little brother was still conscious throughout the emergency operation. Ace found himself suppressing the urge to knock his little brother out with a swift chop to the neck to save the teen from the grisly feeling of his skin being sliced away; the only thing stopping him was Luffy's small squeezes and the fact that Chopper had swore that Luffy was under anaesthetic and couldn't feel a thing from the neck down.

Ace let out a sigh of relief when Chopper – finally – finished his treatment by pasting a thick gauze over Luffy's wounds before motioning for the elder D to lift the small teen into a seated position so that the little reindeer (now back in his brain form) could wrap bandages around Luffy's chest and back, effectively hiding the gauze covered wounds from view. And as soon as Chopper pronounced that Luffy was fine – despite the size and depth of his injuries – and that the fact that he was now almost comatose was simply due to the fact that he had used **Yobidasu **and all he really needed was a lot of sleep and lots of good food, Ace scooped up his, now half asleep, little brother and moved away, towards the edge of the protective ring, so that Chopper could clean up.

At the same time, the rest of the crew started to back up, reducing the size of the protective ring so that they could also check on the state of their captain, without increasing the chance of an enemy breaking the line.

"How is he?" Zoro asked, practically demanding an answer, glaring at the marines in front of him with a look that could melt steel.

"He's just sleeping; **Yobidasu **took a lot out of him," Ace replied softly, just loud enough to be heard by the rest of the crew, but not loud enough to disturb his sleeping sibling, "That coupled with the injury meant that he ran out of energy far too quickly and all but collapsed. Chopper said that he just needed rest and food, so he should be fine." He finished, holding Luffy on his hip with one hand as he picked off marines using small bullets of fire with his other hand.

His answer was met with sighs of relief as the rest of the crew realised that Luffy was going to be fine, then they gritted their teeth in frustration as something else came to mind; they were still on the battlefield, with a comatose captain and a heavily pursued executionee, they had no time to relax, not until they got both Ace and Luffy away of Marineford and far out to sea. 

"We need to move." Sanji grunted, sending several marines flying with a barrage of kicks.

"He's right," Usopp agreed, firing dozens of 'Pop-greens' into the marine ranks.

"If only we had the Sunny; one Coup de Burst could get us out of here in seconds." Franky muttered.

"I could always summon it."

Heads flew around to stare at Luffy, who was now awake and staring right back at his slightly stunned crew.

"W-what did you say?" Ace asked, looking down at the smaller D in shock.

"I could summon Sunny." Luffy repeated, "It wouldn't be that hard, Sunny's easier to summon than you guys." He added at the shocked looks he was receiving.

"Absolutely not!" Ace and Zoro snapped, glancing at each other briefly with a look of respect before continuing, "You're exhausted as it is, using That again could send you into a coma, or worse!"

"It could work." Robin mused, only to be met by looks of horror and shock, "Summoning inanimate objects is always easier, you don't have to worry about their internal organs being ruptured while in limbo, or the fact that they could suffocate if the summoning goes wrong. Anyway, Luffy had always been able to summon Sunny quite easily, and we did say that it was only live summons that he had to be careful with." She reasoned.

Zoro and Ace both turned to Luffy, who was not standing on his own and staring back at them defiantly.

"You really want to do this, huh." Ace asked, and then sighed at the nod he received, "Fine, but as soon as you feel any strain, stop immediately." He continued, sighing at Luffy's triumphant cries.

"Thank you Ace!" Luffy cried, grinning ecstatically.

"Be careful." Zoro cautioned as Luffy took out his daggers again and started to create his summoning pattern.

Luffy looked over his work carefully, and, deeming it accurate, he quickly smeared the number '12' into the triangular gap before standing again and raising his daggers into the air.

"You have to run as soon as I finish." Luffy told his crew and brother, "Sunny is quite big and she'll be summoned straight onto the symbol, if you don't move, you'll be crushed."

"What about you?" Ace asked, a hint of fear in his voice.

"I'll be placed straight onto the deck, so I'll be fine." Luffy replied, waving away his brother's fears, "I'm gonna start now, you better run." He muttered, grinning as they all readied themselves for an all out sprint.

"Okay, here I go…**Kōru Kōru no…" ** He yelled, ignoring the cries of shock from the marines as his crew and Ace sped away from him, and plunging the daggers straight into the bloody palm imprints on the ground, **"Yobidasu!" **

The was a tense pause as the marines and the watching world waited to see what would happen next, then a huge white column erupted out of the ground, completely hiding Luffy from view and causing all observers to shield their eyes from the huge glow. When it was finally safe to look again, the marines and pirates alike gaped at the ship that had materialised out of no-where.

Sengoku cursed as he caught sight of the flag and sails of the ship, there was no mistaking that insignia, this was the Mugiwara's vessel, the Thousand Sunny.

Meanwhile, the rest of the crew, and Ace, sprinted towards said vessel and quickly leapt onto the deck, appearing seconds after the Sunny had materialised.

"Luffy!" Ace cried, spotting his little brother almost instantly and flew to his side, just managing to catch him as he fell forward in a dead faint.

"Chopper!" Zoro yelled, also sprinting to his captain's side and looking worriedly at said teen's pale visage.

Chopper, too, hurried to his captain's side, quickly changing into his half human form and motioning for Ace to set the limp teen down on the deck so that he could check him over. By now the rest of the crew had also appeared at Luffy's side and were watching tensely as Chopper checked Luffy's vitals and then moved onto checking his bandages to see if he had bled through them. He hadn't. Finally, after several tense minutes, Chopper sat back, breathing out a sigh of relief, and then pronounced that Luffy was fine and that he was just exhausted from having to use **Yobidasu **so many times in the same day, that coupled with his wounds and he simply couldn't stay conscious, so now he was just sleeping to regain energy and would wake up when he was better.

Audible sighs were heard as the tense observers – upon hearing that Luffy was fine and was just resting – relaxed and calmed down, before moving away to prepare the Sunny for their escape, leaving Ace and Luffy alone with Zoro. Ace wasted no time in gathering Luffy into his arms, content in simply holding his little brother close and gently running his hand through the sleeping teen's hair, just reassuring himself that Luffy was still there and was not going anywhere. Zoro, meanwhile, was happy just holding one of Luffy's hands, smoothing small circles in rubbery skin and feeling Luffy's pulse with his fingers.

The two men shared a look, before glancing down at the teen who was peacefully sleeping between them, then looking back at each other.

"We'd better get over to the railing and hold on tight." Zoro grunted, "When Franky activates the Coup de Burst we're gonna go flying if we don't have something to hold on to."

Ace nodded thoughtfully, rising to his feet in sync with Zoro and letting the younger man lead him over to the railing, where they promptly sat down again, with Luffy still in Ace's arms and Luffy's hand still firmly grasped in Zoro's.

"Thank you," Ace said, after a moment of silence, smiling easily at the swordsman, "For looking after Luffy when I couldn't." He explained at Zoro's questioning look.

"Someone needs to keep an eye on him, what with all the shit that he manages to get into." Zoro replied, grinning ruefully back at the elder D.

"Ah," Ace chuckled, "So true, I swear, you look away for a moment and he's already managed to get into some sort of trouble." He laughed, looking down fondly at the sleeping figure in his arms.

"Yeah." Zoro chuckled in agreement as the two slipped into a comfortable silence that was soon interrupted by Franky's loud cry of,

"Oi! Hold on everyone, I'm gonna do one short Coup de Burst to get us into the bay! Hold on, 'cause I don't wanna lose anyone!"

Ace and Zoro instantly grabbed hold of the railing, before securing Luffy to the railing using his yellow sash and preparing themselves for the flight; Ace had never been on the Sunny before but he had heard tales of it being able to fly, and, judging from the way that the rest of the crew were insanely excited while holding on to the railing with a death grip, he guessed those rumours were true.

He was right.

No sooner had they secured themselves to the railing when the ship lurched, suddenly shooting into the air, much to the gapes and awe of the marines and pirates below them. It was a short flight, Ace had just begun to enjoy it when they smashed into the bay, somehow managing to land in the only circle of water in the frozen ice.

"Whoa." Ace breathed, still gripping the rail in an iron grip, his other arm wrapped tightly round Luffy.

"I know." Zoro grinned, "We first used that when escaping from your insane Grandfather.

Ace shuddered at the thought that Garp had personally come after Luffy, "The man's always been insane. Crazily strong, but clinically insane all the same."

Zoro nodded in agreement, turning around to untie Luffy from the railing before dragging Ace – and consequently Luffy – across the deck and into the kitchen, away from the prying eyes of the marines and pirates that had lined the edge of the water hole upon their arrival in the bay.

"You should stay here, with Luffy, it'll make it harder for any stupid marines to try and take the both of you out." Zoro said, taking a quick glance to see if Luffy was still asleep before striding out the door.

Ace stared at the door for a second, before flopping down on the green couch pressed against the wall of the kitchen, lying down on his side and nestling into the fluffy pillows, wrapping both arms around Luffy who was snuggled into his chest. He wanted to go out and fight, he really did, but for Luffy's sake he stayed, he didn't want Luffy to wake up and panic because his brother had disappeared after he had just rescued him from being executed. So he stayed, burying his head into Luffy's hair and quickly dozing off.

When he woke it was to a smooth voice washing over him and a gentle hand carding through his hair.

"Mmm, wha?" Ace muttered sleepily, turning sluggishly to face the room.

"About time you woke up." The familiar voice chuckled.

"Wha…Marco?" Ace murmured, recognising the voice almost instantly.

"Who else would I be?" Marco said, sounding affronted.

"Yeah, yeah, damn phoenix." Ace grunted, pulling the – still sleeping – teen in his arms flush against his chest, "What happened? You know, after I left?" He asked, turning to face the grinning first commander.

"Well," Marco started, "After this – frankly amazing – ship flew into the bay, Pops gave the signal of retreat. I have no idea how we managed it, but we all got outta there pretty damn fast, then Red Hair showed up."

"Shanks came?" Ace asked, slightly bewildered.

"I still don't know why he lets you talk to him so casually," Marco muttered, shaking his head in disbelief, "But yeah, he came and then practically blackmailed the whole of Marineford to let us (pirates) go before he got involved. Unsurprisingly, it worked and then he watched us all sail away (your little brother's crew followed the Moby Dick in the retreat) and then left to who knows where. Oh, and if you're wondering about the bandages that you're supporting, you can thank your brother's doctor for that; the crazy little reindeer ran around in a frenzy, treating practically everyone he came across." Marco said, chuckling slightly.

"Yeah, Chopper's the best." A sleepy voice muttered from the safety of his brother's arms.

"Luffy!" Ace exclaimed in surprise, "Are you ok? Are you sure you should be up?" He asked, hurriedly checking Luffy over for any signs of exhaustion, while Marco watched on silently. Finally deciding that his little brother was fine, Ace relaxed back into the pillows, with Luffy still held securely against his chest.

"You don't know how much you surprised the world at Marineford, do you?" Marco asked, directing this question at the smaller D.

"I said I would rescue Ace and I did. There's nothing to be surprised about." Luffy said, staring back at the first commander defiantly.

There was a moment of tense silence before Marco cracked up, filling the air with his laughter, "Good one brat." He chuckled at the brother's bewildered faces, "But seriously, what was that summoning thing you did? Not to mention the Haki, beating up an admiral and your crew's insane powers! Seriously, you guys are insane!" He muttered, still very amused with the situation.

"The summoning was my second devil fruit ability, the Kōru Kōru no mi (call call fruit), which lets me call things if I've already marked them; **Yobidasu** was an example of that. And Rayleigh said I have Haoshoku Haki, so he trained me to use it." Luffy explained bluntly.

"Wait, you have _two _devil fruit abilities?! And Rayleigh, as in 'Dark King' Rayleigh?! And, seriously, Haoshoku Haki on top of that?!" Marco asked, looking shocked – which he had every right to be considering the circumstances.

"Yes, he has two devil fruits, I think it's because they're both the same type, which is why he isn't dead right now, and I am very proud of the fact that he also had Haoshoku Haki." Ace explained, looking proudly down at his sleepy brother.

"And Rayleigh did say that his old nickname was 'Dark King." Luffy added.

"Oh, and could you pass that knowledge around – only to the commanders and Pops though – and tell everyone else to butt out cause it isn't their business. It'll get real old real fast if people keep waking us up to ask the same questions." Ace continued.

"Could you go away now, I'm tired, Ace is tired, we wanna sleep." Luffy finished, yawning as he did.

"Right…." Marco muttered, as he removed his hand from Ace's head and stood to leave.

"Bye Marco!" The two brothers yelled as said commander slipped out of the door and onto the deck, to the watching eyes of both his crew, and the Mugiwaras, "They're both insane." He pronounced, much to the amusement of the watching crews.

"We know." The replied.

END

**A/N: I am so sorry that it took this long to update. I hope you like this fic though. R and R please. **

**Tenebrae**


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